Update says schools have fixed internal problems

The Broward school district is making sure history doesn’t repeat itself.

District officials said they’ve spent more than a year implementing new ethics measures and procedures after a grand jury report in February 2011 blasted the district for ineptitude and widespread corruption.

“It ’ s not just going through the motions of addressing the issues that were noted, it’s really about a shift in the culture and behavior,” said Superintendent of Schools Robert Runcie. “Everybody wants to move the district forward.”

An internal and external audit report presented Wednesday updated the school board as to how far the district had come from the blistering findings of the grand jury.

The district’s

chief

auditor, PatrickReilly, said so far 48 out of the 51 grand jury recommendations had been implemented. That included new ethical practices, revamping facilities and construction management, and reassessing certain district procedures. He added the other recommendations should be completed within the year.

The district still needs to address policies pertaining to naming school facilities after School Board members, using technology to track permits and licenses of contractors, and problems with construction contracts.

Officials said the district paid an outside company about $ 10,000 to review changes specifically relating to the 21 ethics recommendations.

But, according to the audit report, the district didn’t quite implement all the recommendations the way the grand jurywanted.

While it suggested a total ban on campaign contributions from vendors or contractors doing business with the board, the district imposed a “cone of silence,” limiting contributions only while the vendorwas trying to do business with the district.

Runcie said he wasn’t concerned “as long as how we’re dealing with them is transparent and is done consistently and people live by the rules.”

During Wednesday’s meeting, board members mostly remained quiet.

Outgoing member Maureen Dinnen praised the new ethics measures, but she said she resented the report’s assumption that all were guilty by association.

“It blatantly said we all had knowledge of all this stuff, all guilty of this stuff. It really irritatesmeto thisday … they didn’t apply to me,” she said.