Post Dispatch Article Documented in Fox C-6 Legal Bills as "Press Release"

At the August 23, 2012 REACH Open House at Clyde Hamrick, I had a discussion with one of Fox’s former administrators about some of the issues going on in our district.

Our discussion occurred just days after I had received a cease and desist letter from Fox's law firm threatening me with legal action if I didn’t stop talking to administrators and former administrators as well as school board members at Fox about Section 504 issues and other issues such as in person and online bullying.

The former administrator's response really hit a nerve. Especially since I had just received the cease and desist letter days before which I mentioned during our discussion as well.

The discussion also inspired me to write an article about a Dear Colleague letter on Retaliation Law issued by the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights in 2013.

The former administrator told me:

"You should pick your battles and I don't think this is one of them you should fight. You've got to think about your parents. This is your home. You don't need to be doing battle here. You should let someone else do it. It's because of who you are and who your family is as to why you shouldn't fight this battle."

I took that as a challenge. The cease and desist letter also fueled my efforts to bring about change in our school district. And, it reminded me of when our former superintendent, Dianne Brown (Critchlow) called my dad into her office to talk about our complaint.

Bullying In the St. Louis Post Dispatch

I was already determined to bring about changes at Fox after Fox and their law firm had an article published in the Post Dispatch in August 2010.

The article's intent was to bully us for filing a complaint with ED OCR. The online title of the article was not the same as the print article. The online article title referenced the 504 Plan as a "Special Status".

The article incited online comments directed at me and my family, including death threats which the Post Dispatch refused to remove from their website. I forwarded the comments to ED OCR and USDA OCR since they were clearly harassing and retaliation for filing complaints with ED OCR and USDA OCR.

The article mentioned the cost of legal fees. The article failed to mention the fact that when the district removes a 504 Plan, your only options, if you disagree with the school's decision are to file for Due Process, file a civil suit against the district in a court of law or file a complaint with the Office for Civil Rights. The article also failed to mention the fact that we were going to withdraw from the Due Process Hearing so Fox's attorneys decided to file Due Process against us so Fox could settle the disagreement.

PD Article Failed To Document District Wide Compliance Review Investigation

The 2010 Post Dispatch article failed to note important information that they showed us during our interview such as their discovery of the March 2010 District Wide Compliance Review investigation of Fox.

Then there was the privacy issue with Missouri DESE

When I was first contacted by the Post Dispatch to interview me for an article, I asked the reporter how she had gotten my name. It immediately threw up red flags considering we were preparing for a Due Process Hearing with Fox. The timing was not a coincidence.

The reporter explained to me that the Post Dispatch made a Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) request with ED OCR to see if there had been any complaints filed against any school districts in our state for students with life threatening food allergies. I'm sure that's something that reporters do all the time. She told me that our complaint was the only one. First, I told the reporter that any complaint filed by a parent or advocate with ED OCR is redacted and would not have identified us.

I also told the reporter that there were other complaints filed against other districts in our state filed with ED OCR by families with life threatening food allergies. Our complaint was not the only one as the reporter had claimed.

Post Dispatch Sunshine Request Leads To Contact Information

The Post Dispatch reporter went on to explain that they found our name after they made a Sunshine Request with Missouri DESE to find out if there were any emails related to the complaint. The reporter explained that our names were contained in emails between Missouri DESE and Fox but that our daughter’s name had been redacted out of the emails.

Missouri DESE failed to protect our identity. Or, maybe it was just really good investigative reporting by the Post Dispatch. It could also be that this was the fight that I shouldn't fight and that was the reason why.

Fox's Legal Bills Documented the Post Dispatch Article as a "press release"

So when I finally received copies of legal bills from the district in 2014 and I saw the bill from 2010 from the law firm that referenced the “press release”, it confirmed how and why the article was written.

I found other articles over the years about parents who had filed complaints filed with ED OCR in other school districts. The same tactic was used against them by the same law firm in order to bully and retaliate against them as well.

The following article from 2013, was written prior to the tracing of IP addresses to Fox C-6 administrator's homes and cell phones. It covers the Dear Colleague Letter sent out to all school districts in the U.S. in 2013.

For some reason, the Kansas City U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has had a lot of trouble recognizing retaliation against parents in our region. It makes a person wonder just how much documentation is needed before it's considered retaliation. Perhaps online defamatory comments traced to administrator homes and cease and desist letters by the school district's law firm isn't enough documentation.

Or, perhaps the KC ED OCR office just didn't have time to read the Dear Colleague Letter regarding harassment and retaliation due to the backlog of complaints in their office.

Dear Colleague Letter On Retaliation Law To School Districts From ED OCR

Fox C-6's March 2018 Resolution Agreement and March 2010 District Wide Compliance Review Update

When ED OCR ignores 7 years of evidence including a Due Process Hearing ruling that was reversed as well as the evidence that initially led to the Washington DC U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (ED OCR) Headquarters request for a District Wide Compliance Review in March 2010, it's easy to see why there weren't any "findings" in the March 2018 Resolution Agreement that Fox signed with the Kansas City ED OCR (KC ED OCR) office.

That's what I learned while speaking with the supervisory attorney who worked on Fox’s District Wide Compliance Review when it was reopened in the spring of 2015. You'll like the reasons given as to why they ignored how Fox was handling 504 issues prior to 2015.

There's no reason to have a Section 504 law if it's not going to be enforced by ED OCR and schools aren't held accountable. And, there's no reason to have OCR offices handling complaints or compliance reviews if it takes a decade or more to resolve them. It would save parents, school districts and attorneys a lot of time, effort and money.

ED OCR's Case Processing Manual (CPM) explains why school districts enter into a Resolution Agreement with ED OCR. The CPM states that "OCR can resolve allegations at any point during the course of the investigation, if appropriate. OCR resolution agreements will be drafted to ensure compliance with the civil rights laws and regulations enforced by OCR."

SECTION 302 - Resolution Agreement Reached During an Investigation

Per SECTION 302, "Allegations under investigation may be resolved at any time when, prior to the point when OCR issues a draft letter of findings under CPM Section 303(b), the recipient expresses an interest in resolving the allegations and OCR determines that it is appropriate to resolve them because OCR’s investigation has identified concerns that can be addressed through a resolution agreement. The provisions of the resolution agreement must be tied to the allegations, and the evidence obtained during the investigation and will be consistent with applicable regulations."

The language in SECTION 302 has been watered down since 2005, to lessen the appearance of legal Non-Compliance when school districts enter into a Resolution Agreement with ED OCR. In 2005, ED OCR's Case Processing Manual stated:

"After the investigation begins, a complaint may be resolved in either of the following ways:

• OCR determines that there is insufficient evidence to support a conclusion of noncompliance; or
• OCR determines that there is sufficient evidence to support a conclusion of noncompliance and the recipient enters into an agreement."

96 Months To Conduct a District Wide Compliance Review of Fox C-6 KC ED OCR's nearly non-existent effort to completing Fox's District Wide Compliance Review teaches other school districts and attorneys that school districts don't have to follow federal law and that any non-compliance issues in a school district will just go away if given enough time and parents or advocates stop checking on OCR's progress of their complaint(s) or an open District Wide Compliance Review of their school district. And yes, it really did take the KC ED OCR office 96 months to complete their Compliance Review of Fox C-6 and determine whether or not Fox was providing Individualized Health Plans to students with disabilities instead of Section 504 Plans.

As a comparison, it only took the Atlanta ED OCR office 24 months to complete a District Wide Compliance Review for the same issue of the Memphis City School District. It took another 25 months after Fox signed the Resolution Agreement in March 2018 for KC ED OCR to complete their review and approval of Fox’s updated Section 504 Manual. It’s the same Section 504 Manual that Fox originally agreed to update by June 30, 2009. But who’s counting days, months, years or decades when it comes to properly identifying students who qualify for a Section 504 plan. Deadlines Allowed to Slip The 504 manual and changes to Fox’s policies that OCR asked for was a real sticking point for the law firm representing Fox at the time. So, rather than hold Fox accountable and live by the terms of the Resolution Agreement, ED OCR allowed deadlines to slip year after year. The KC ED OCR office was doing the best they could to do “vigorous enforcement” of the law. They told me over the years about their staff shortages and people being pulled off to work on other cases. They told me time after time that they hoped to be sending out a “monitoring” letter to the district soon and that they hoped to complete Fox’s Compliance Review in the next several months as I checked on our complaint and Fox’s District Wide Compliance Review between 2009 and 2020. Fox Still Being "Monitored" Speaking of compliance reviews, I recently discovered that Fox’s March 2010 District Wide Compliance Review is still being “monitored” by ED OCR as noted in the compliance review data I received last week from a recent Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) Request. My FOIA request asked for the status and purpose of all District Wide Compliance Reviews initiated over the past 20 years in all of the OCR Regional Offices across the country. I made a similar request in 2015 but just for Kansas City and Atlanta offices and wrote about it in 2015. I made the FOIA request so I could compare how long it took the KC ED OCR office to complete compliance reviews compared other offices across the country.

Concerns Regarding Who Would Conduct the Compliance Review In 2010, I emailed the regional enforcement director asking him what office would be performing Fox’s District Wide Compliance Review because I had concerns if the KC ED OCR office was conducting Fox’s compliance review. That’s because the KC ED OCR office had allowed Fox to miss deadline after deadline that Fox agreed to in the May 1, 2009 Resolution Agreement. And, not to my surprise, I was informed that the KC ED OCR office would be handling Fox’s Compliance Review. Chief Attorney Concerns One of my other concerns was the fact that the chief attorney in the KC ED OCR office who oversaw complaints and compliance reviews had worked as general counsel for the Kansas City Missouri school district prior to working for ED OCR. When the chief attorney retired after moving up to the director position, I discovered that his successor had also worked as general counsel for the Kansas City school district prior to working for ED OCR. Then at the beginning of 2019, I learned that the acting director at KC ED OCR who oversaw the completion of Fox’s District Wide Compliance Review and the signing of the Resolution Agreement left ED OCR and went to work for the law firm that represented Fox when the District Wide Compliance Review was initiated in March 2010. It’s also the same law firm that we battled with between August 2008 and June 2014 and the same one that sent me a cease and desist letter trying to stop me from speaking to our school board and administrators in our district about our case with ED OCR. Fox changed law firms in June 2014 when the online cyberbullying scandal made national news. ED OCR Ignores What Occurred Prior to 2015

So, when I found out from the supervisory attorney during our May 2020 phone call that the Kansas City ED OCR office ignored everything that had occurred prior to 2015 in their compliance review investigation, it was easy to see why ED OCR didn’t note any adverse "findings" such as retaliation by school district administrators cyberbullying parents for filing OCR complaints (which is a violation of Section 504 law) and giving Individualized Health Plans to students instead of Section 504 Accommodation Plans for those students who were qualified for one and requested one. My telephone conversation with the supervisory attorney justified my concerns of allowing the KC ED OCR office to conduct Fox’s District Wide Compliance Review. The supervisory attorney told me that she didn’t know the history of the review before she was assigned to work on it. It seems like the KC ED OCR office would have problems handling investigations if they don't pass on information to others. She said that they, "Basically opened the investigation from anew and took a fresh look at it because we realized that time had passed and what they did five years ago wasn't going to be relevant as what was happening currently. So, we basically did a new Compliance Review with new information and looked at how over time it changed." She also noted that, "The district has had a lot of turnover with personnel. There's a new law firm that's representing them now. The new current law firm has, I'm not trying to sound like I'm putting a plug in for them by any means, it's been on time with regards to submitting the data we've requested. They've been cordial. I don't feel that they've hidden information from us." She explained that ED OCR reinitiated contact with Fox in the spring of 2015 and started requesting additional documents and going through the policies and procedures and that the results of that investigation is what led to a Resolution Agreement that was signed by the district in March 2018. She informed me that ED OCR was currently monitoring the district. She told me, “I regret that the case and this review took as long as they did. That is not what should happen to any person who files a complaint with our office but I can’t explain the length of time prior to my involvement.“

Vigorous Enforcement? So, if you’ve ever filed a complaint with the KC ED OCR office and wondered what happened to it, maybe ED OCR really is understaffed and they really are hoping to work on your complaint real soon. It’s that “vigorous enforcement” of the law by ED OCR that we can count on to hold our school districts, school district attorneys, administrators and school boards accountable for their actions. Then again. Maybe not!

Fox C-6's March 2018 Resolution Agreement and District Wide Compliance Review Letter

Must Watch! HBO's "Bad Education" Movie Receives Two Emmy Nominations

The movie "Bad Education" just received two Emmy nominations the other day.

Bad Education is a movie about the true story of the misuse of taxpayer dollars and the deception by some of the administrators in a Long Island school district in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. The movie may remind you a lot about what happened in the Fox C-6 School District in 2013-2014 and the misuse of credit cards by some of our former school district administrators.

I’ve watched Bad Education a few times already since it first premiered on HBO a few months ago. It’s an excellent movie. It reminds me of so many things that was going on in our school district during Dianne Brown-Critchlow’s tenure as superintendent that I was documenting on my FoxC6Watchdogs blog back then.

Of course, I was looking into several things going on in our school district at the time like the over the top salary being paid to our superintendent, the comments be posted about me online for asking questions at board meetings as well as the ongoing 504 issues in our school district.

No Audio or Video Recordings of School Board Meetings

And, since Fox wasn't audio or video recording school board meetings back then, the public was pretty much kept in the dark about what I was asking our school board and our administrators. School board meeting minutes didn't provide any details as to what I was asking during public comments.

I would bet that if any of Fox’s former school board members watched the movie Bad Education, that it would bring back quite a few memories for them as well. It was at the February 2014 school board meeting when I asked our Fox school board members during public comments how they could approve bill payments without good descriptions of bill payments and without being provided copies of the credit card statements.

Great Scene About Personal Purchases Brings Back Memories

There’s one scene in the movie when the superintendent, played by Hugh Jackman, tells the school board members about the amount of taxpayer money that the auditor found that was spent on personal purchases by the school district’s business manager. That scene makes me wonder if our school board members felt the same way when they started looking at the credit card statements that were received in bulk by fax after I made a Sunshine Request for copies of them in April 2014.

Shredding Documents

I’m guessing that the district credit card statements may have been part of the documents that were shredded by Mark McCutchen, Fox’s former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) during Dianne's tenure as superintendent. Mr. McCutchen abruptly left the district after I made a Sunshine Request for copies of the credit card statements. Mr. McCutchen didn’t respond to the auditor’s questions during the state audit. His input to the audit should have been crucial to the state audit.

Grandview School District Patrons Can Relate

The parents and patrons in the Grandview School District can probably relate to the movie as well.

Some of the administrators in the movie Bad Education and the business manager at Grandview were prosecuted for their improper use of taxpayer dollars.

No one was prosecuted at Fox related to the findings of the state auditor's report that I'm aware of.

U.S. Attorney Told Me They "Didn't Find Any Criminal Intent"

The U.S. Attorney’s office told me in November 2017 that their office “didn’t find any criminal intent” when they reviewed the state auditor’s report, the FBI report and the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office report due to the fact that our school board had approved all of the bill payments even though Fox's board members weren’t provided copies of the credit card statements. It was suggested by the U.S. Attorney's office that our school board needed to improve its approval processes.

Freedom of Information Act Request for FBI Report

I've made a couple of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to the FBI for a copy of the FBI Report related to the state audit. I have a copy of the Jefferson County Sheriff's report and a copy of the state audit.

My first FOIA request response from the FBI informed me that the FBI was unable to identify any main file records responsive to my request related to Dianne Critchlow or the Fox C-6 School District. My second request was made with the actual FBI report number (46H-SL-7854210) provided to me by Jefferson County Sheriff Dave Marshak.

The FBI's response to my second FOIA request informed me that it may take up to 1500 days to respond to my request.

Is that what people refer to as sweeping things under the rug?

Bad Education is a great movie!

It shows what can go wrong when school board members and outside auditors don't do a very good job of oversight of a school district.

https://www.hbo.com/movies/bad-education

If you don't have HBO, you can always sign up for a Free 7 Day Trial just to watch the movie.

Who's Watching Over the Office for Civil Rights?

I've learned a lot over the past 7+ years dealing with the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (ED OCR) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Office for Civil Rights (USDA OCR).

One thing I discovered was the fact that there is a pattern of practice of complaints remaining open for years in the Kansas City ED OCR Regional Office from across the multi-state region. I have had many parents and advocates contact me over the years about complaints they've filed with ED OCR that have remained open for years.

It's even more troubling to know that ED OCR allows school districts like Fox C-6 to spend nearly 7 years trying to meet the terms of the Resolution Agreement that the district signed in May 2009 to become compliant with federal law.

How do students expect to be protected when there's no enforcement of the law or enforcement of Resolution Agreements?

From a FOIA request, I recently learned that the Kansas City ED OCR office has only completed 7 out of 17 school district wide compliance review investigations that have been assigned to them over the past 10 years.

I voiced my concerns to the Washington D.C. ED OCR office back in 2010 when I found out that the Kansas City ED OCR office was going to be conducting the district wide compliance review of Fox C-6 instead of the Washington D.C. office. My concerns have definitely been validated over the years.

Completing only 7 out of 17 compliance reviews over the past decade is a very disturbing statistic and one that should raise the eyebrows of the public as well as our U.S. Senators and Congressman. Taxpayers are paying a lot of people six figure salaries for what would be considered a failing grade if scoring their work like a test, 7 out of 17 is 41%. That's an F in anybody's grade book!

What are the directors and enforcement directors who oversee the Kansas City ED OCR office doing?

It doesn't seem as if they are ensuring that investigations are getting done in a timely manner.

The information regarding the 7 out of 17 compliance reviews was obtained through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights in Washington D.C..

Kansas City Open Compliance Review Investigations
There is one open compliance review that was opened in 2007 investigating the Wichita Unified School District #259 in Kansas.

There are two open compliance reviews that were opened in 2009; one investigating the Bayless School District in Missouri and the other investigating the Jenks Public School District in Oklahoma.

There are two open compliance reviews that were opened in 2010; one investigating the Fox C-6 School District in Arnold, MO and the other investigating the Rapid City Area School District #51-4 in South Dakota.

It's difficult to even imagine that the Kansas City ED OCR office has only been able to complete 7 out of 17 compliance reviews assigned to them over the past decade. Why can't they complete these investigations?

It should have been very easy for the Kansas City ED OCR office to determine that Fox C-6 was non-compliant with federal law when the district wide compliance review was initiated in March 2010. The district had already agreed to sign a Resolution Agreement in May 2009 which stipulated what the district was required to do in order to become compliant with federal law.

Students Previously Denied 504 Plans Are Provided 504 Plans
In August 2014, after Fox switched law firms and the district demoted Fox's Section 504 Coordinator and assigned the assistant superintendent of secondary education to the position, several students that had been previously denied Section 504 Plans for years at Fox were finally appropriately provided Section 504 Plans. This happened after ED OCR helped with an Early Complaint Resolution after Fox changed law firms.

There are people working in the Kansas City ED OCR office that know why compliance reviews and other complaints aren't getting completed. They should use the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 to speak out about what's been going on in the Kansas City ED OCR Office. They owe it to the students who have been denied proper protection under the law for years. It's truly sad and disgraceful to think of the pain that that the KC ED OCR office has caused for families covered by their regional office over the years.

As it stands now, it’s very easy to see how school districts have been able to get around federal law for years. There's no accountability of the school districts nor ED OCR itself.

It's time for attorneys and staff in the Kansas City ED OCR Office to stand up and report what's been going on for years in that office that's been allowing compliance reviews to remain open for years and complaints to remain in limbo for years as well.

KC ED OCR staff and attorneys probably have the same fear of reprisal in their office just like it was for teachers and administrators in our school district. Everyone was too afraid to speak up about what was going on in our school district.

I wrote to the former director of enforcement for the Office for Civil Rights over the Kansas City office in September 2015. His name is Randolph Wills. Mr. Wills did not respond to my first email inquiry regarding Fox's open District Wide Compliance review that's been open for nearly 6 years. After 10 days of not receiving a response from Mr. Wills, I emailed him again. He responded to my second email. He informed me that he was no longer the Enforcement Director over the Kansas City ED OCR office. He informed me that Debbie Osgood was the current director of enforcement over the KC Office and that he had forwarded my email to Debbie Osgood.

Debbie Osgood responded with the following email on October 1, 2015:

Mr. Simpson: 

I am pleased to respond to your email, which Randolph Wills forwarded to me as the Enforcement Director for OCR’s Kansas City enforcement office. Your email outlines your concerns regarding the Fox C-6 compliance review being investigated by OCR Kansas City. I share your concern about the time that the Fox C-6 School District compliance review has been open. The resolution of this outstanding review (as well as others) is a priority for OCR. Although I cannot give you a specific date by which the review will be completed, I want to reassure you that the Kansas City office is devoting substantial resources and attention to the resolution of this review and other pending reviews. 

You also asked about a Fox C-6 complaint being monitored. My understanding is that a number of the items in that agreement have been completed and Kansas City staff have worked with the district to resolve the remaining items. 

Debbie Osgood
OCR Enforcement Director

Ms. Osgood copied Bill Dittmeier, the current Director of the Kansas City Office for Civil Rights in her response to me. I laughed when I read Debbie Osgood’s response. Many others laughed as well when I told them about the response I received from ED OCR.

How would anyone believe Ms. Osgood’s statement that “the Kansas City office is devoting substantial resources and attention to the resolution of this review and other pending reviews” when the Kansas City office has only completed 7 out of 17 compliance reviews assigned to them over the past decade?

Three weeks ago I wrote back to Debbie Osgood, Bill Dittmeier and Randolph Wills asking why the Kansas City ED OCR office has only been able to complete 7 out of 17 district wide compliance reviews in the past 10 years. None of them responded to my email. Although I did receive Read Receipts from all three of them.

On Monday of this week, I sent my question about the Kansas City ED OCR office to Sandra Battle. Sandra Battle is is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Enforcement at ED OCR in Washington D.C. I copied Debbie Osgood, Bill Dittmeier and Randolph Wills when I emailed Ms. Battle as well as the Department of Justice. No one has responded yet to my concerns regarding this issue.

Perhaps no one wants to be held accountable.

It certainly seems that the patterns of practice in the Kansas City ED OCR office would be a concern for anyone dealing with this OCR Office. As an added tidbit of information, it took nearly 60 days for ED OCR to send a response to my FOIA request. It would appear that ED OCR is not as familiar with federal law regarding FOIA request response requirements like the USDA Office for Civil Rights is. Federal law dictates that all FOIA requests must be responded to within 20 days.

A recent USDA Office for Civil Rights FOIA response letter referenced the law in their response (5 U.S.C. § 552).

You can read about FOIA law requirements in the article below located on the U.S. Department of Justice's website:

FOIA UPDATE: THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT, 5 U.S.C. SECT. 552, AS AMENDED BY PUBLIC LAW NO. 104-231, 110 STAT. 3048

I find it truly amazing that the Enforcement Directors for the Office for Civil Rights don’t seem to do what their job titles state that they do

You would think that the Enforcement Directors at the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights would be holding people accountable and making sure that the regional offices that they oversee are doing their job.

Perhaps it’s time that our U.S. Senators and Congressman take an in depth look into what’s going on in the Kansas City ED OCR office.

ED OCR’s Enforcement Directors don’t seem to want to answer questions as to why these compliance reviews have been open for so many years. Perhaps the Enforcement Directors will be willing to answer these questions for Congress. I have offered to testify in congressional hearings about our dealings with ED OCR. It's about time that someone starts looking into what's going on in the Kansas City ED OCR office since taxpayers are paying a lot of six figure salaries for such abysmal completion results.

You may wish to contact the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights as well to see if you can get any answers. Perhaps there are some investigative reporters that may be interested in following up on this story as well. It certainly seems to be a huge expenditure of money for very little results.

Here is the contact page:

Key OCR Staff: U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights 

Fox C-6's State Audit Results Not Expected Until Late This Year or Early Next Year

It was reported in The Rock newspaper this month that the state audit of the Fox C-6 School District won't be completed until the end of the year or the beginning of next year. Originally, the community was told that the results of the audit would probably be released in September 2015.

The time to complete the state audit is pretty impressive considering how long the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights in Kansas City has been investigating the school district for a District Wide Compliance Review.

5+ Years and Still Under Investigation
On July 28, 2015 I received a response from the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (ED OCR) to my June 2, 2015 Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) request regarding the status of Fox C-6's March 2010 District Wide Compliance Review.

The response came from Bill Dittmeier, the Director of the the Kansas City ED OCR office.

Bill Dittmeier's response stated that Fox's District Wide Compliance Review is still "an open investigation".

It's difficult to understand how Fox can still be under "an open investigation" after five and a half years considering that the Memphis City School District in Tennessee underwent the exact same compliance review investigation in March 2010 which resulted in the Memphis City School District signing a Resolution Agreement in January 2012.

ED OCR's Growing List of Open Compliance Reviews
It appears that the Kansas City ED OCR office has a documented pattern of compliance reviews and complaints that have remained open for years. An August 22, 2012 FOIA request to ED OCR was responded to on May 3, 2013 which listed 3 open compliance reviews in the Kansas City ED OCR office. Two of the open compliance reviews had been open investigations from 2009. They were for the Bayless School District and the Cape Girardeau School District. The third compliance review was the Fox C-6 compliance review which was opened in March 2010.

I recently made a FOIA request to obtain an updated list of open compliance reviews in the Kansas City ED OCR office compared to other ED OCR Regional Offices.

A Lingering Problem
Two years ago at the June 2013 Fox C-6 school board meeting, I asked Fox's school board about the status of Fox's District Wide Compliance Review investigation and the status of the district's Resolution Agreement with ED OCR that Dan Baker signed in May 2009 during Public Comments.

I wrote about these open in issues with ED OCR in a July 6, 2013 article. That article also listed the numerous "monitoring letters" sent to the district over the years following up on the district's May 2009 Resolution Agreement. Charges from Fox's former law firm document fees related to responding to those ongoing "monitoring letters".

Documentation Contradicts Superintendent Dianne Critchlow's Statements

at June 2013 Board Meeting

Using the link below, you can read several years of FOIA request responses from the Kansas City ED OCR office regarding Fox's open district wide compliance review. The July 28, 2015 FOIA response was the first response from Bill Dittmeier who succeeded Angela Bennett as the Director of the Kansas City ED OCR office in 2014.

Below is an excerpt from Bill Dittmeier's FOIA response:

The compliance review concerning the Fox C-6 School District is an open investigation. OCR has determined that the release of the information you have requested at this time could reasonably be expected to interfere with our enforcement activities. In addition, the information you have requested includes personally identifiable information that, if released, could be unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. Therefore, OCR is denying your request.

July 28, 2015 ED OCR FOIA Response Letter

You may be wondering why Fox would still be under investigation after five and a half years.

Is this something that our community should be concerned about?

From a financial point of view, it is a concern because the district has spent tens of thousands of dollars over the past 6+ years in legal fees related to the compliance review and the still open May 2009 Resolution Agreement as well as other OCR complaints from others in the district.

District attorneys responded to monitoring letters, worked on updating district policies to get the district in compliance with federal law and prepared Dan Baker, school staff and the Fox C-6 school board for interviews in the fall of 2010. District attorneys also charged Fox C-6 taxpayers to respond to my Public Comments at board meetings as well as emails sent to the school board and administrators. There were also charges in the legal bills for reading this blog.

The legal bills are very interesting to read. The disappointing thing about the legal bills was that the former law firm didn't break out their billable time on Fox's bills like they did for the Wentzville school district. This makes it much more difficult to analyze how much was actually spent on various issues since many line items are grouped into lump sum billings.

I requested copies of the Fox C-6 legal bills via Sunshine Law in August 2014. I had made numerous requests before dating back to 2009 for the legal bills but had always been given excuses as to why the district couldn't or wouldn't make them available. I should also note that I didn't receive copies of the legal bills until April 2015 after I contacted the Attorney General's Office for help in obtaining them.

I didn't receive all of the bills I requested because according to Fox's current CFO, the bills were destroyed prior to the 2010-2011 school year.

Fox's Compliance Review Noted in Report to the President
In 2012, Fox's 2010 compliance review was referenced in ED OCR's FY 2009-2012 Report to the President and Secretary of Education that was issued in 2012 by former Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, Russlynn H. Ali. Fox C-6's compliance review is listed on the map on page 5 as FAPE 2010 as a Section 504 compliance review. I'm surprised that Russlyn Ali included Fox's Compliance Review in the report since the investigation hasn't been completed yet.

2009-2012 ED OCR's Report to the President and Secretary of Education

It's interesting to read ED OCR's statements in the 2009-2012 Report to the President about how OCR must vigorously enforce the nations's civil right's laws.

I'm not sure how many people consider an investigation lasting more than 5 years, "vigorously enforcing the nation's civil rights laws".

Randolph Wills the Director of Enforcement over the Kansas City ED OCR office wrote a letter to Fox C-6's former legal counsel on April 7, 2010. He informed Fox that compliance reviews are designed to address systemic issues and to ensure that violations are readily identified and promptly eliminated:

As OCR explained in its notification letter to the District, compliance reviews are designed to address systemic issues and to ensure that violations are readily identified and promptly eliminated. The instant compliance review is consistent with the stated purpose and goals of OCR compliance review activities. Accordingly, I have determined that the compliance review will proceed.

What's even more interesting is the fact that the other school district, Memphis City School District in Tennessee, that was investigated for the same issue was investigated and agreed to sign a Resolution Agreement with ED OCR in January 2012. ED OCR posted a Press Release in April 2012 about the Memphis City School District's Resolution Agreement along with the Resolution Agreement itself.

April 2012 ED OCR Press Release

about Memphis City Schools Compliance Review Agreement 

Memphis City School District Compliance Resolution Letter

Memphis City School District Compliance Resolution Agreement

It's amazing how quickly the Atlanta ED OCR office was able to conduct and resolve the issues in the Memphis City School District considering the fact that the Memphis City SD had 110,361 students and 191 schools in their district when the investigation was opened compared to Fox having roughly 11,000 students and only 18 schools. It causes one to question the abilities and/or ethics of some of the Regional ED OCR Offices.

Concerns Over Which OCR Office Handles Investigations

In 2010, the Kansas City ED OCR office was assigned to conduct Fox's District Wide Compliance Review. I voiced my concerns to the Washington, D.C. ED OCR office back then about assigning the compliance review to the Kansas City ED OCR office. My concerns were based upon the fact that there didn't appear to be much enforcement effort out of the Kansas City ED OCR office based upon my conversations with many other advocates and individuals who had been dealing with the KC ED OCR office for years.

The fact that Fox C-6 has been given extension after extension to meet their obligations on the still open May 2009 Resolution Agreement and the fact that Fox's District Wide Compliance Review is still "an open investigation" after five and a half years, I think my concerns have been validated.

According to Fox's legal bills Fox's former law firm prepared the district and board prior to the interviews and then represented them during the ED OCR interviews in 2010.

So how long will it take for ED OCR to complete their March 2010 investigation?

According to Fox's legal bills, it appears that the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Office for Civil Rights (USDA OCR) was able to conduct and complete a compliance review of the district sometime in 2012 or 2013 that I was unaware of. There were charges in the legal bills to review the findings.

There was never any mention of a USDA Compliance Review in any of the board meeting minutes that I recall. However there was never any mention of the March 2010 ED OCR Compliance Review in board meeting minutes either.

I've made a FOIA request to obtain a copy the USDA compliance review findings.