By Juan Montoya
On January 8, after hearing of alleged irregularities with Brownsville Independent School District vendor Grafik Spot, we filed a request for information with the district asking for the payments made to the company over the last five years (2013-2017).
At the time, the district said it was requesting an exemption from releasing the information because of what it claimed to be confidential information that was involved in an ongoing criminal investigation and sent its objection to the Texas General Attorney's Office.
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The district's appeal to the Texas Attorney General's Office says it was taking exception to El Rrun-Rrun's because the information requested "is part of a multi-agency investigation by several law-enforcement offices including the Brownsville Independent School District. The law-enforcement agencies are investigating potential criminal activity."
It cited Texas Government Code Section 552.105 which deals with "Law Enforcement, Corrections and Prosecutorial Information."
"As stated previously, the District's Police Force along with other State and Federal law enforcement agencies are investigating suspected criminal activity.
The requested information is part of the criminal investigation. At this time, the investigation remains active by the BISD Police Department and the various law enforcement agencies.
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The information made the subject of this request is part of the investigation and we believe are privileged and excepted from disclosure under the section of the Act."
That was in January.
It is now almost May and we were pleasantly surprised when we saw the requested information in our email. So it wasn't exempt after all? We suspected half as much when BISD board general legal counsel Baltazar Salazar told board trustees during an open meeting that the company was a "vendor in good standing" and approved the district awarding it a contract for printing supplies in 2018.
Right then and then we knew the district (and specifically Salazar) was playing games with the public's right to know. Even before BISD released the requested info (after four month-delay), we had learned that in four months of 2015 alone (July to October), they had paid Grafik Spot $1,2562,120.
Apparently, that was only the tip of the iceberg. We did the math on the new information released and found that the BISD did business with the company to the tune of millions. They started up with a mere $18,093 in 2014, but quickly reached the millions the next year.
The items purchased ranged from custom nugget boxes ($366,600) to food tray liners ($319,950) to Grafik Spot's "set-up" for the purchasing department ($4). How many of these purchases were part of the criminal investigation performed for the district? And what was the result of the investigation cited to keep these transactions from the public?
We'll be asking.
To see the entire list of purchase orders and the cost of the items, click on the link below:
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui=2&ik=643034ff4a&view=att&th=162fd1b3764fcb0c&attid=0.1&disp=inline&safe=1&zw
On January 8, after hearing of alleged irregularities with Brownsville Independent School District vendor Grafik Spot, we filed a request for information with the district asking for the payments made to the company over the last five years (2013-2017).
At the time, the district said it was requesting an exemption from releasing the information because of what it claimed to be confidential information that was involved in an ongoing criminal investigation and sent its objection to the Texas General Attorney's Office.
The district's appeal to the Texas Attorney General's Office says it was taking exception to El Rrun-Rrun's because the information requested "is part of a multi-agency investigation by several law-enforcement offices including the Brownsville Independent School District. The law-enforcement agencies are investigating potential criminal activity."
It cited Texas Government Code Section 552.105 which deals with "Law Enforcement, Corrections and Prosecutorial Information."
"As stated previously, the District's Police Force along with other State and Federal law enforcement agencies are investigating suspected criminal activity.
The requested information is part of the criminal investigation. At this time, the investigation remains active by the BISD Police Department and the various law enforcement agencies.
The information made the subject of this request is part of the investigation and we believe are privileged and excepted from disclosure under the section of the Act."
It is now almost May and we were pleasantly surprised when we saw the requested information in our email. So it wasn't exempt after all? We suspected half as much when BISD board general legal counsel Baltazar Salazar told board trustees during an open meeting that the company was a "vendor in good standing" and approved the district awarding it a contract for printing supplies in 2018.
Right then and then we knew the district (and specifically Salazar) was playing games with the public's right to know. Even before BISD released the requested info (after four month-delay), we had learned that in four months of 2015 alone (July to October), they had paid Grafik Spot $1,2562,120.
Apparently, that was only the tip of the iceberg. We did the math on the new information released and found that the BISD did business with the company to the tune of millions. They started up with a mere $18,093 in 2014, but quickly reached the millions the next year.
In 2013: $0
In 2014: $18,093
In 2015: $1,660,804
In 2016: $586, 415
In 2017: $7,849
2018: ???
Total to 2017: $2,256,961
The items purchased ranged from custom nugget boxes ($366,600) to food tray liners ($319,950) to Grafik Spot's "set-up" for the purchasing department ($4). How many of these purchases were part of the criminal investigation performed for the district? And what was the result of the investigation cited to keep these transactions from the public?
We'll be asking.
To see the entire list of purchase orders and the cost of the items, click on the link below:
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui=2&ik=643034ff4a&view=att&th=162fd1b3764fcb0c&attid=0.1&disp=inline&safe=1&zw