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Timmy Teepell neglected to close out his state email account when he left the governor’s office 11 months ago–or did he?

July 6, 2012 by tomaswell

State Education Superintendent John White has Emailgate, that embarrassing communication with the governor’s office in which he laid out his plot to shroud legislators and the public with a cloud of B.S.

Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser apparently accesses parish emails kept for use only in emergencies like hurricanes, floods and tornadoes but used by him to solicit contributions to his political fundraiser—to be attended by Piyush Jindal, no less.

And Rep. Joe Harrison (R-Gray) uses state letterhead to solicit contributions to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) so his pals in the House and Senate can get expense-paid trips to ALEC’s Salt Lake City conference later this month.

Things just can’t get any better.

Or can they?

Timmy Teepell ostensibly departed his $165,000-per-year position as Gov. Piyush Jindal Chief of Staff last October to head up the Baton Rouge Southern office of OnMessage, Inc., a political consulting firm out of Virginia—but he apparently forgot to close out his state email account.

Yet, more than eight months after his announced departure and 11 months after he officially terminated his employment, Teepell not only continues to maintain a high-profile presence in and around the State Capitol and the governor’s mansion (his Jeep Wrangler remains a fixture in both locations and he was seen on almost a daily basis on the floors of the House and Senate during the recently completed legislative session), but he also retains an active state email account in the governor’s office.

Moreover, there is no physical addressed listed for a Baton Rouge office of OnMessage, nor is there a local telephone listing. Nor is OnMessage, Inc. registered in Louisiana, according to corporate records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State.

Last Oct. 24, OnMessage posted a news release on its web page announcing that Teepell had joined the firm “as a partner and head of our new Southern office.”

The news release went on to say that Teepell “will open and manage our new OnMessage Southern office in Baton Rouge and will work on campaigns throughout the country.”

When Jindal announced that Teepell was leaving to join OnMessage, he said the move was “effective immediately,” even though the last official date of employment with the governor’s office was July 1.

Yet, when Teepell left the state payroll on July 1, 2011, he was quickly placed on the payroll of Jindal’s campaign which paid him more than $91,300 between July 15 and Dec. 30.

In the months immediately following the October announcement of Teepell’s departure, Jindal’s campaign was also making payments to OnMessage of $46,000 in November and another $55,000 in December—time during which Teepell was supposed to have been employed by OnMessage, leaving unexplained why the governor’s campaign would be making simultaneous payments to both Teepell and OnMessage for those two months.

Jindal’s ties to OnMessage go back at least to the 2007 governor’s race. OnMessage was used extensively in that race by Jindal’s campaign which shelled out approximately $1.3 million for consulting work by the firm. Additionally, Curt Anderson, another OnMessage partner, ghost-wrote Jindal’s book Leadership and Crisis.

In February, it was announced that Teepell’s OnMessage office in Baton Rouge had signed on to work for Republican Congressman Bill Cassidy’s 2012 re-election campaign. A check of Cassidy’s campaign expenditures, however, revealed no payments to either Teepell or OnMessage through the end of June.

An email to Teepell at Timmy.Teepell@la.gov from Capitol News Service was not answered. Likewise, emails to Jindal Executive Counsel Elizabeth Murrill and Communications Director Kyle Plotkin asking why Teepell still had an active state government email address did not receive responses.

Perhaps that was because OnMessage’s Baton Rouge Southern office took a long weekend for the July 4th holiday.

Posted in BESE, Charters, Education, Governor's Office, Public Records, Transparency | Tagged , | 1 Comment »

Notable Quotables (in their own words)

July 5, 2012 by tomaswell

“I, along with other members of the Louisiana Legislature, greatly appreciate your contribution to the scholarship funds. Your $1,000 check…can be sent directly to me…”

–Exerpt from solicitation letter by State Rep. Joe Harrison (R-Gray) seeking contributions to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) Louisiana Scholarship Fund. The scholarship fund pays the expenses of state legislators to attend ALEC conferences.

“Relative to the attached letter which you mailed out (on state letterhead) soliciting contributions to the ALEC Louisiana Scholarship Fund, please provide me with a complete list of those to whom these solicitations were sent.”

–Public records request submitted on July 5, 2012, to State Rep. Joe Harrison by LouisianaVoice.

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Ethics, Legislature, Legislators, Notable Quotables, Public Records, Transparency | Leave a Comment »

State Rep. Joe Harrison uses state stationery to solicit $1,000 contributions in order to support ALEC agenda

July 5, 2012 by tomaswell

It’s been awhile since we’ve written about the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), but State Rep. Joseph Harrison (R-Gray) has proven himself a more than capable successor to former Rep. Noble Ellington (R-Winnsboro).

ALEC is a national organization comprised of hundreds of state legislators from around the country as well as corporations which fund the bulk of the organization’s expenses. Heading the list of those corporations is Koch Industries.

ALEC’s corporate members write “model legislation” for lawmakers to take back to their states for passage into law. Foremost among those are education reform, prison privatization, Medicaid reform, state employee pension reform and reductions of public services.

Ellington is the former state representative who served as national president of ALEC in 2011 and hosted ALEC’s national meeting in New Orleans last August. Ellington, after 24 years in the legislature, did not seek re-election last fall and upon leaving office in January, was hired as Chief Deputy Commissioner for the Louisiana Department of Insurance at $150,000 per year.

Now, not to be outdone, Harrison, the state ALEC chairman, has sent out a form letter on state letterhead soliciting contributions of $1,000 each to finance the travel of Louisiana legislative ALEC members to an ALEC conference in Salt Lake City July 25-28. The identities of the recipients of his requests for money were unknown.

The letter opens by saying, “As State Chair and National Board Member of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), I would like to solicit your financial support to our ALEC Louisiana Scholarship Fund.”

But this letter wasn’t for college scholarships.

“Why does the scholarship fund need your support?” Harrison asked, perhaps rhetorically, in his letter of Monray, July 2. “With over thirty Louisiana Legislators serving on ALEC Task Forces, your support will allow the opportunity (for legislators) to attend conferences funded by the ALEC Scholarship Fund.

“These conferences are packed with educational speakers and presenters, and gives (sic) the legislators a chance to interact with legislators from other states, including forums on Medicaid reform, sub-prime lending, only privacy, environmental education, pharmaceutical litigation, the crisis in state spending, global warming, and financial services and information exchange. All of these issues are import (sic) to the entire lobbying community (note the reference to “lobbying community”).

“I, along with other members of the Louisiana Legislature, greatly appreciate your contribution to the scholarship fund. Your $1,000 check made payable to the ALEC Louisiana Scholarship Fund and can be sent directly to me at 5058 West Main Street, Houma, Louisiana 70360. ALEC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit educational organization as designated by the IRS.”

It is no surprise that ALEC would be concerned about pharmaceutical litigation, environmental education, Medicaid reform and sub-prime lending since many of its corporate members comprise pharmaceutical companies, oil and chemical companies, medical providers and mortgage lenders.

Even though ALEC picks up the tab for legislators to attend conferences all over the nation, at least 16 Louisiana legislators filed expense reports with the House and Senate for reimbursement of more than $20,750 in expenses related to their attendance at last August’s annual meeting in New Orleans. Additionally, ALEC reimbursed many of those same legislators, plus 19 other members and former House and Senate members an additional $56,200 for other ALEC conferences in such locales as San Antonio, Chicago, San Diego and Washington, D.C.

It is not known if Harrison received any “scholarship” money to attend ALEC conferences, but records obtained from the Louisiana House of Representatives by LouisianaVoice show that he received $9,295.78 in expense reimbursements from the state to attend six conferences in New Orleans, San Diego and Washington, D.C. over a four-year period, from December 2008 to August 2011.

Those included:

• December 2008: Washington, D.C. ($1,896.43);
• September 2009: New Orleans “Out of the Storm Conference ($496);
• December 2009: Washington, D.C. ($1,981.24);
• August 2010: San Diego, California ($970.50);
• November 2010: Washington, D.C. ($2,031.14);
• August 2011: New Orleans ($1,920.97).

LouisianaVoice has submitted two public records requests to Harrison. The first asks for the names of the “over thirty” legislators who are members of ALEC and the second requests, since the contribution solicitation was made on state letterhead, that Harrison provide the identities of every person to whom the solicitation was sent.

It would also be of more than passing interest to know how much in state postage was spent on soliciting funds for a lobbying organization that denies it’s a lobbying organization.

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Ethics, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, Politicians, Prison, Privatization, Public Records, Retirement, Taxes, Transparency, Vouchers | 11 Comments »

Notable Quotables (in their own words)

July 4, 2012 by tomaswell

“I think that John White is still lying. He is in full CYA mode and assumes that he will simply be able to BS his way out of the contradiction the Monroe News-Star has caught him in. After all, it’s a method that has worked perfectly well for him ever since he arrived in Louisiana.”

–Comment by a Times-Picayune reader in response to State Education Superintendent John White’s contention that there was “nothing inappropriate” about his email to members of Gov. Piyush Jindal’s staff in which he outlined his plan for “muddying up the narrative” of reporters who exposed a Ruston school with no accommodations but which was approved for 315 voucher/scholarships.

Posted in BESE, Education, Ethics, Notable Quotables, Public Records, Transparency | 3 Comments »

White shifts into Emailgate damage control mode; ‘Nothing inappropriate,’ and Loch Ness monster proves Creationism

July 4, 2012 by tomaswell

As State Education Superintendent John White shifts into a damage control mode, his explanations of Emailgate have taken on a bizarre tone reminiscent of the man, who when his wife catches him cheating with another woman, asks, “Are you going to believe your eyes or what I tell you?”

Or perhaps the attorney who is sued because his dog, allowed to run loose, bites a neighbor: “He must have been provoked because my dog doesn’t bite. Besides, he is never allowed out of my fenced yard. Anyway, I don’t own a dog.”

White’s explanations are about that plausible.

White, in emails to the obviously complicit strategists for Gov. Piyush Jindal on the eve of his confirmation hearing in the final days of the recently completed legislative session, laid out his plan to diffuse criticism of his department’s lack of oversight in awarding voucher/scholarships. No one in Jindal’s office attempted to rein him in.

At the center of the controversy was the approval of 315 vouchers for New Living Word in Ruston, a facility lacking in classrooms, textbooks and teaching staff.

School principal, the Rev. Jerry Baldwin, said the school teaches primarily by DVDs and even though he lacked accommodations for the 315 students, he was moving ahead “on faith.”

White’s misdirection ploy began with the emails to Jindal Communications Director Kyle Plotkin and the governor’s policy adviser Stafford Palmieri and continued several weeks later with a Department of Education (DOE) response to a public records request from LouisianaVoice. That response was sent by DOE public information officer Sarah Mulhearn:

“In your email dated June 25, 2012, you asked, ‘Do you have a date when the Department of Education originally approved New Living Word in Ruston for 315 vouchers?’ The specific information you requested is not available, because final seat numbers have not yet been decided. No school, including New Living Word, has been approved for any definite number of vouchers/scholarships. The 315 is only the number requested by the school.”

A form letter sent out by the department to schools dated May 18 (well before White’s confirmation hearing and his email to Plotkin and Palmieri), however, would seem to suggest otherwise:

“Congratulations on being accepted into the Louisiana State Scholarship Program!” the letter began. “We hope that you are excited to be part of this program, and we look forward to working closely with you in service to the students of Louisiana. Now that you are officially (emphasis added) part of the Scholarship program, we’d like to take a few moments to introduce the next steps in this process.

“Before May 22, you may immediately begin to market yourself to potential students! Feel free to get creative and help spread the word about the available scholarship seats at your school. Also, please note that the Department will contact you soon to detail which fees administered by your school will be covered by the scholarship allocation. As a participating school, you will be the primary ‘on the ground’ point of contact for interested students and their families.

“In addition, we would like to post information about your school on our website for interested students and families.

“Starting on May 22, student applications will be made available to you and posted on the Louisiana Department of Education website. Students will have until June 29 to submit an application. We ask that you make physical copies available at your school or in your community for students and families interested in submitting an application to your school.

“On May 21 and 22, the Department of Education will host webinars that will walk you through the process of accepting an application, verifying student eligibility and entering the application into the Department of Education online data system.

“…The Department of Education will run the lottery process for all students in mid-July. We will provide your school with a list of all of the students who will receive an offer to your school, along with their contact information. At that point, we’re requesting that you reach out to these students, confirm their eligibility once again, and enroll them as soon as possible.”

None of this lends evidence to White’s contention during his confirmation hearing that the department was approving only “preliminary” acceptances in its letters to the schools.

Yet, White said in his email to the governor’s office that he planned to “take some air out of the room on the floor tomorrow…” and that he would “like to create (emphasis added) a news story about ‘the next phase’ of determining seats in schools…” He also said his planned strategy “would allow us to talk through the process with the media, muddying up a narrative they’re trying to keep black and white.”

The emails revealed White’s plans for deliberate duplicity, a concerted effort to mislead a legislative committee poised to determine whether or not he would be confirmed for his position, as well as the media and the public. Yet, after news of the email message broke in the Monroe News-Star, he attempted to defend them by saying there was “nothing inappropriate” about the emails.

He insisted that DOE has planned all along to take a closer look at private schools accepting large numbers of voucher students. He said his note to Plotkin and Palmieri referred only to the timing of making public the next step in the process.

The letter, however, which makes no mention of any additional steps in the approval process, went out to 115 schools, most of them church affiliated, that have been approved for nearly 5,000 vouchers.

Besides the New Living Word School in Ruston, there also is the BeauVer Christian School in Beauregard Parish whose owner was sentenced to four years probation and ordered not to conduct any financial transactions on behalf of the school. That school was approved for 119 vouchers.

Then there is Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake in Calcasieu Parish, approved for 135 vouchers. That school, to support its teaching that the earth is only 6,000 years old, uses textbooks that portray the fictional Loch Ness monster as a real, modern-day dinosaur as some sort of convoluted means of debunking evolution.

Such is the nature of Piyush Jindal’s education reform in the only state in the U.S. where florists must be licensed but there are no accountability standards for charter schools and no certification requirements for charter school teachers.

Posted in BESE, Charters, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Legislature, Legislators, Public Records | 6 Comments »

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