Thread by @SeanMcCarthyAZ

/1 I spent the last several months trying to figure out why a school district was blatantly violating state law. Paloma Elementary near Gila Bend was told by their auditors 4 yrs in a row their reconstruction program was supposed to be voter approved.
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2/ Paloma rebuilt their elementary school for 100 kids for $10M+ w/ property tax increases. I asked them if they got voter approval. They played possum and pretended I had asked a different question.

3/ After some time and calls from lawyers, they admitted they were in violation. They claimed ignorance of the law and politely asked me to find something else to do. FOIA requests showed the district was well aware of A.R.S. 15-342 (25), the relevant law.

4/ This law is not a small detail. 49 TINY, mostly rural districts must abide by it. Districts this small have ZERO budget limits. They levy & spend what they chose. 15-342(25) says they cannot use those $ for construction unless they get voter approval.

5/ After several weeks, I FINALLY got my FOIA request for their audit questionnaire. Smoking gun found. Auditors told them 4 yrs in a row they were breaking the law.

6/ So how does this happen? A district breaks the law for years and no one notices? Auditor General said it wasn't enough to send the district to the State Board of Ed. (Or maybe they never saw it?) District says they told the Governing Board it was "No Big Deal"

7/ It ended up being a big deal for taxpayers. School tax rates are up 58%. Big value drops from the local solar plant are messing up their projections.

8/ The district told me to talk to Project Manager Tim O'Malley. He was certainly unapologetic. "It was a small audit hit, at most" "Everyone knows everyone out here and they knew what we were doing"

9/ Paloma will go to its voters this Nov for retroactive approval. The question is how often are local govts ignoring audit hits? Why is it so hard to see audit questionnaires? Access to all public audits should be easy. /END