Roundtable: Gompers Investigation, District Attorney Endorsement, Dividing Cities Into Districts

MS: Students have good grades but standardized test scores tell a different story. What is going on at the charter schools? Stephan has been endorsed by Bonnie Damaris. Her botched murder case has some wondering why. Cities are invited with other districts but not because they want to. KPBS Roundtable starts now. Welcome to our discussion I am Mark Saur. Hello, Brad. BR: Hi Mark MS: It is good to have you with us. John Wilkens , hello. JW: Hello Mark MS: I am glad you're here. AST: Hello. MS: A dozen years ago, there was a takeover by the state. It sits in a neighborhood plagued by gang activities. A charter high school boasts a spotless campus and well-behaved and well-groomed students. The director was nationally recognized for his enthusiasm and devotion to students at the school. Behind the stories and appearances are accusations of the masking of broad under the performance of the students. There are testing statistics. BR: We ran numbers going back five years to the most recent statistics. What it shows was the students have consistently performed at the bottom of the district and among the goals in the state of California. 5% of the students met the threshold on the ACT scores. We are telling statistics in that same year, 91% of the students did not meet the threshold and math and 40% are below the standard for English. It is pretty bad. MS: The grades tell a different story. I want to make clear you focus the story on the charter school. BR: Correct. We have gotten criticism and I want to make it clear that this story is not about charter schools in general. This is about one school. MS: Educators look at this. Today do they consider standardized test scores a better indication? BR: A teacher told me that teacher’s grade when it comes -- it is different. It varies. The one measure they have consistent is standardized testing, whether they like them or not. It is across the board that they can look at. MS: It is apples to apples expect AST: Some teacher said this. They are testing different things they are more mechanized. Maybe other kinds of test could show students having a lot of intelligence that doesn’t show up on the testing. Is that the way it is? BR: Not really, but there are a lot of test scores. The state has SATs. And has a piece. The used to be called a star test but now they are the standard assessment test. Across every test, these numbers are true. The only thing that you would look at would be actual grades pick. Most teachers tell us they were never told directly to change grace. A couple, they did tell me they were told to change this grade. BR: Most teachers said they were pressured to change the grades by being told they were murdering children if they had below a C. How dated expect the consequences of a failing grade expect if they do not graduate or get into college, they end up back on the streets. MS: Okay. We do have a bite and I want to set this up. This is a teacher on that pressure. Teacher: That was a constant pressure. Initially, the students should not fail. The teacher’s fail and not the students. And what from that all students should pass to all students should get A's. MS: I did want to point out that a teacher said she had an experience -- she had not experience pressure. BR: This rings true those who left before 2009 when it became a high school. This pressure was not there as much. She said that she had pressure in others ways and they were expected to put in 16-hour days and they put out cell phone numbers to kids. Expectations were extremely high for the teachers. Yes. MS: They have a relationship with the University of California. They accept students on a scholarship with graduates. Wonder how that relationship works. BR: UCSD upped the price. They replicated the school. What they did, they opened up the scholarships and they are full rides. Every year, they get more and more. There are a few. There are five or six schools. I think it was last year, those numbers were really high. Almost half of the graduating class had a full ride. JW: This is interesting in terms of how they are doing. Actually, we had some interesting numbers about how they compared to their peers. How many were still enrolled. MS: How did they get along in college? BR: Back they said they are struggling. Their friends that they went there with are gone. I should point out, that should be expected. These are kids from underperforming communities. The data shows that they enter cohorts do worse in college. This is a number of those that say they were not prepared. This is a college preparatory Academy. That is what distinguishes them. ASJ: They keep the numbers up because they are funny dependent? Is it about the reputation? BR: The Board of Directors, two of them, they have a lot at stake. One is a former UCSD professor who was involved with the preschools. There is a lot of reputation at stake. There is a lot of money at stake. Gompers had $75 million through grants. They received this national acclaim that they are doing so well and other schools are modeling schools on what they do. There is a lot at stake. MS: What do the leadership has to say in reaction to this? BR: We sat down last week with Cecil who was the chairman of the board. We had a two-hour interview. We laid out the data. We laid out the fact that we had 11 teachers on the record. We are in the record with those who can confirm everything. They said they did not care. They do not believe the data. They do not believe the teachers. They were disgruntled. They never asked the names of the teachers. They just assumed they were disgruntled. Yet went to the board meeting. I said would make a difference if I told you that 14 more teachers -- I do not care. ASJ: 14, is that compared to hundreds? How big of a percentage is that? BR: I want to say there are between 40 and 50 teachers. The turnover is so high with the teachers. There are probably hundreds have been there over the last 12 years. We have had one or two teachers who have said you're wrong. That is not the case. 95% have confirmed the report pick JW: The teachers that you talk to they had suggestions on what they would like to see changed? BR: The main suggestion is that they are doing a lot right. This is a multifaceted story. It is not black and white. They have done a lot of good. The suggestion is they should focus less on showmanship where the kids are failing and they are taken out of classes they need to sing and dance for the graduation. They need to take -- to talk to them. The first month is focused on culture and the last month is focused on graduation. That is a show and not academic. MS: Investigation, there is a tension from the credit Union Association pick BR: Yes. They are tasked with accrediting charter schools. They have told us as soon as the story published; they reached out and started the process of looking into this. MS: We will watch this as we go forward. It is hard to imagine anything more horrible than your daughter stabbed to death on her bedroom floor. Things got much worse. Michael the son was charged with the murder. The prosecutor pushed the case toward trial and now has the backing of the district attorney to replace her as the top law-enforcement official. The irony here is that she used to support from Cheryl and Steve crow to win elections over Paul in 2002. We are trying to find a case -- we have covered this a long time. Let's start with the 911 call to the police. JW: Richard was a homeless man. He was well known to the police. He was seen in the neighborhood visiting almost every house and looking in windows and knocking on doors. He wanted to find someone he knew. A couple of the neighbors called 911. The police rolled up to the house before 10:00. The officer Saul the door closing. He did not get out of his car. He left to wonder if that -- who that may be. MS: You talk to the neighbor and they reported that encounter. Then, they did not focus on Richard when they found Stephanie's body the next day. Why did they turn away from this? JW: They made a judgment early on that it had to be an inside case. They were focused on people who were in the house at the time. They quickly dismissed Richard as be addled by mental illness to go into the house and stab Stephanie and get out with five people asleep in house. MS: They knew him and he did not seem to think he was capable. He is interrogated for many hours. He made incriminating statements. He got a confession from a friend. A judge ran the trial. They did preserve some key statements. It was overlooking how the crime was to have been committed. What blew the case? JW: They are beginning the trial against one who was charged in the case. They got the jury selection. A call comes from a forensic lab reporting that Stephanie has -- her blood was found on a sweatshirt Richard was seen. MS: That blows the case up. We were wrapping this up but let's flash forward. Bonnie has an ambition to become the district attorney. This is a hugely visible trial. It was a bundled case. How did he criticize her? JW: It was a central part of the campaign. She accused the DA of having a lapse of judgment. They failed to investigate the suspect. She was critical of the failure of the investigators to send out Richards clothing for testing. The defense attorney pursued that. The DA did join in but she basically said they had failed in the role as a check and balance against the police department. MS: It was a close race. JW: A few weeks before that election, Stephen Cheryl was the parent, they did a commercial criticizing Paul thinks and endorsed Bonnie for the district attorney. A lot of people thought they pushed her over the edge expect the prosecutor was working and that was Stefan. MS: And now Bonnie is stepping down as the DA. 14 years later, she is backing the prosecutor. You interviewed Sheryl Crow about news of that. JW: She is not happy. She is very stunned by everything that happened. Which he learned about this, she was very upset. She considers it to be an insult to her daughter. She believes Bonnie was using her daughter as a campaign prop. ASJ: The decision to blame the brother was made before she came on the case. She was following the department's policy on the case. That was her argument. JW: This was the second prosecutor on this case. She joined five months into the case. The 3 teens had already been charged. The grand jury had reviewed the case. Summer Stephan in took over for the 707 hearing to see if they should be tried as adults. It was not just a perfunctory role. She had a lot of work to do on it. She was a key participant to decide whether confessions could be used at trial. MS: They complained against Stephan in the various hearings. It was comments she made publicly. JW: Some of it was public comment. There was a feeling that Summer Stephan was overreaching the evidence that would name the teams. They were critical of the fact that the other hearings that we mentioned, they hearings ended with judges with raising serious concerns about the proxy fusion -- prosecution case. Every time that happened, the supporters believed that the DA would take a step back. Maybe we should reevaluate this. [Indiscernible - multiple speakers] JW: Let's see if this makes sense pick MS: This was before the blood evidence. JW: Yes. Maybe they would do the check and balance thing. They could continue to charge ahead with the case. That was some of the criticism. ASJ: She was following along with the take on the case. I believe she did not expect to be on it as long as she was. This suggests she was a team player, which plays into this idea that she is being picked to be the successor because she is a team player. Someone who has committed herself to the department and possibly at the expense of her own perception of events. JW: You know, it is important to fully that she this happened almost 20 years ago. Stephanie had been in office eight years when it happened. She is a 27-year veteran at the office. A lot of things have happened since that case. She believes this would be a good administrator. Summer Stefan was involved in the one people would remember recently, the shooting with the Carlsbad elementary school. ASJ: I know I saw emails for months from different people endorsing summer Stefan's position before most of us had woken up to the fact that this would be on the election this year. JW: She was investigated before she declared she was running. I want to get back to that point. She did not have responsibility because she inherited it. We talked about our prosecutors. That just because you came to a case late that that absolves you of responsibility for being a check and balance, they have a problem with that. Also, I want to get this in. Summer Stephan will tell you that once the blood came back, she was a strong advocate in the DA office for dismissing the charges against the teenagers. MS: They were dismissed eventually to come back around with the state attorney general office. And they were convicted of voluntary manslaughter. They were in prison and that was thrown out on a technical charge or an issue on appeal. He was retried and was actually acquitted. The Crow family got more than $9 million? JW: Yes. MS: That was from Escondido and the police about. Michael Crow got a rare verdict of innocent who looked at the evidence in the case. We have to see. We have run out of time but we have to see what impact this has with the supervisors and appointment and if it is summer Stephan -- ASJ: Maybe she is a good candidate but there are people questioning whether there is a conspiracy before anybody has woken up to the alternatives. It may come against her and that election. MS: Voters in San Diego have got used to choosing the city councils. That is not the case across the candidate -- candidates have to compete citywide. Wire cities moving toward district elections? ASJ: They are doing it reluctantly. It turns out that is the voting rights act which came into effect in 2002. It has been in effect for 10 years. Only recently has the legal profession and people who are interested in getting more minority representation on Kathy, only recently has it started to take off and it is spreading like wildfire around the state. It is wide in San Diego County. Five North County cities have gone to the district elections because it turns out it is almost important to fight the move in court. The law makes the burden of proof, it is easier than the federal voting rights act to prove that minorities are not get a look when it comes to elections. You have to prove that polarized voting is occurring. We have to go to district elections because minorities are getting representatives on city councils. Three cities were sued or threatened to be sued by the same attorney. Looks like it is difficult to win those cases. MS: Some cities have gone through and got to court with them? They do not win? ASJ: Palmdale and Modesto spent millions of dollars in legal fees. For small city, that is out of the question. Feels like if you get a letter and you look back at the precedent that has been sent, of course. I remember the mayor said we will fight this. We will not give into this and they did for a few months and he spent $200,000 and they realize, we will not win this. They capitulated. MS: We have a bite out of Oceanside explaining the logic that you just outlined. ASJ: It was last month. Bite: I do not see a win for us. I understand what you want. I have been with you. At the bottom line, I have to protect the assets of the city. I will support this, even though I do not want to pick MS: He does not want to pick ASJ: The vote was 3-2. It is the same in Carlsbad. I think the city Council know that they cannot afford to fight this. A couple of representatives have said we have to take a stand on this. The mayor said no. The majority said we cannot afford to spend millions on fighting a case that we are going to lose. Some people supported and say this is a positive move. This is something that will change the way the representation on city councils occurs. It gives minorities a better chance of fielding candidates and to get into office. MS: Has that been the empirical evidence? Is that the experience? ASJ: Kevin, he was a very rich man pick MS: He is an attorney. ASJ: Yes. Is on a good thing. He is not a big corporation. He picks up the phone. He is an attorney who has found a good case that he can decide and he can win in every situation. It is something that he said he will pursue. I called to find out whether they got a letter. He has said this is something I will pursue in other cities in San Diego County and they said not yet. MS: People do not want to district elections, what is the basis of the argument? ASJ: I think there are good arguments on both sides. Escondido was incensed about it. They said it would lead to tribal wars. You can look at as leading to neighborhood representation but the fact is, if your representative is in one neighborhood and there are five city Council members are each representing different neighborhoods, could be you have more turf wars in the cities. That is instead of having everybody voting for the city as a whole. Some say this is what we have wanted. This is more neighborhood-based legislation. People who could not afford to run a campaign can now run and get in and represent portions of the neighborhood. MS: JW: Have significant minorities and never had said anybody on the city Council? ASJ: Yes. That was the case. I think it was in a San Juan. In San Diego, Escondido had a Latino on the Council. The mayor is a minority. He said what is wrong with us? La Vista, the have had Latino people and they have all had a few Latinos. That is their argument. Luck. I do not think you can say token. We have Latinos on the city Council but when you look at the way minorities are increasing, it is an exponential increase. I think it is difficult for minority communities to raise the funding to get representatives on the city Council. I think this is an interesting development at the grassroots level. MS: We have to see how that plays out. We will see how many have the elections when we roll around next year? Is coming up sooner than we think. That does wrap up a nether week of stories at KPBS Roundtable. MS: I would like to think my guests. Brad Racino of inewsource, John Wilkens at the Union Tribune, and Allison St. John with KPBS news. All of the stories are available on our website. Thank you for joining us today on the roundtable.