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Witness Testimony
Dr. Arlene Ackerman
Problems with the E-rate Program: Waste, Fraud, and Abuse Concerns in the Wiring of Our Nation's Schools to the Internet Good morning Chairman Greenwood, Ranking member Deutsch, and members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you on the matter of the federal E-rate program and the extremely interesting and revealing experiences that we have had in San Francisco's schools as participants in the program. I began my current role as Superintendent of San Francisco Unified School District, which serves the 59,000 public school students in the City and County of San Francisco, in July 2000. Needless to say, as I went about my work in these first several months I had a considerable amount to learn about the detailed context and conditions of San Francisco's schools. In addition to dealing with the core work of a school superintendent, such as evaluating school performance, organizing the district office, and collective bargaining, I was also hired with a mandate to improve the District's business practices. Although I had worked on difficult fiscal and operational issues in other school districts, I soon learned of activities that for me represented a new low in my thirty-plus years of public education. I saw the beginning of a trail of evidence that was ultimately found to lead to a number of individuals and organizations who plotted carefully to enrich themselves by depriving children. In the fall of 2000, two former staff members provided me a copy of an E-Rate application that had been submitted for $50 million. As I reviewed the document, several elements of the application troubled me. First, it indicated that the District had set aside the approximately $8 million that was necessary to contribute as a matching requirement. I knew that this was not the case. One of my first priorities had been to become intimately familiar with our financial condition, and nothing I had studied or heard indicated that any District funds had been set aside for this purpose. Second, the description of the equipment and infrastructure that was to be funded with the grant proceeds seemed incoherent and did not reflect a strategy to align technology with instructional objectives. I saw woefully little evidence of sufficient planning, especially for an investment of this size. Finally, and perhaps most obvious, the document materially misstated facts in describing the District. Among other things, the grant indicated that the District covered 400 square miles, in contrast to the actual figure of forty-nine (49) square miles. It also claimed that there is no mass transit system in San Francisco when we actually have one of the nation's largest public transportation systems. In many respects, the grant seemed to be describing another district altogether. As Superintendent, I typically require that documents that bind the District to any funding or other commitments undergo legal review. In this case, my elevated concerns about this grant led me to contact then City Attorney Louise Renne for assistance in reviewing the document. As Ms. Renne, current City Attorney Dennis Herrera, and investigator George Cothran will describe in detail, so began an investigation that ultimately led to the extremely disturbing conclusions that necessitate this morning's hearing. However, despite the disturbing and cautionary aspects of our experience with E-Rate, I very much hope the members of the Subcommittee and the public will interpret my comments as supporting reform of the program, not its elimination. I fully agree with the goals of the program - to increase all students' access to technology, paying particular attention to the digital divide that would otherwise place the internet out of the reach of many children of low income families. While our experience and those of several other school districts have revealed serious problems with the E-Rate program, I would respectfully ask policymakers to consider that the program has brought technology to unprecedented numbers of public school students. Nearly all classrooms and school libraries are now connected to the internet, most as a direct result of the E-Rate program. The program certainly needs to be reformed. To that end, I am gratified that San Francisco schools and the extremely capable attorneys and investigators who have assisted us have helped accelerate discussion about how to increase scrutiny of E-Rate applications and otherwise reduce the possibility of waste, fraud, and abuse in this important program. At this point I would like to introduce San Francisco's former City Attorney and our school district's former General Counsel Louise Renne. |
