Denver Public Schools withheld fraud investigation report regarding missing funds at East High School

An internal investigation that Denver Public Schools officials originally withheld from disclosure shows an East High School club cannot account for $565 collected through a cash app, The Denver Gazette has learned.

But getting that information required two public information requests.

Will Trachman, general counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation, said that ought not be.

“We have a right to know where every single penny of our tax dollars is going,” said Trachman, who has been on both sides of the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) as a requester and as a custodian of records.

“It really does betray the idea of taxpayer transparency.”

Trachman previously served in the Department of Education as deputy assistant secretary in the Office for Civil Rights and as general counsel for the Douglas County School District.

Headquartered in Colorado, Mountain States Legal Foundation is a nonprofit law firm dedicated to defending and expanding constitutional rights since 1977.

Scott Pribble, a district spokesperson, did not explain why the second CORA request was necessary.

“The district does not regularly receive a request for this type of document and initially determined that the report sought should be withheld under deliberative privilege,” Pribble said in an email to The Denver Gazette. “After taking a second look at the document when the request was resubmitted, the district determined it could properly release a redacted version of the report.”

The newspaper formally requested the report after the Board of Education finance and audit committee last week was briefed on three suspected cases of misuse and misappropriation of district assets.

Stacey Wheeler, the district’s CORA officer, denied the entire Aug. 13 request on the grounds the information was “deliberative” — despite a 2009 Colorado Court of Appeals ruling that found documents that contain “public and confidential information” should be redacted and released.

CORA requires state records — with some exceptions — to be available to the public to promote government transparency and accountability. One of the exceptions is what’s called “the deliberative process,” which is used to protect records, that if released, would stifle frank discussions between government officials.

On Aug. 19, The Denver Gazette submitted a second CORA request, this time citing Ritter v. Jones, the Colorado Court of Appeals 2009 decision.

Wheeler provided the report — heavily redacted — on Thursday.

Without it, the public would not know the extent of suspected fraud, waste or abuse of district assets and fiscal misconduct.

“The fact that they are being petty with $600 of losses indicates to me this is routine for them,” Trachman said. “If they’re doing this (denying records) over $600, I promise you they’re doing it over $6,000 and $60,000.”

Internal auditors released the fraud investigation to the district’s HR and legal departments on May 22.

The investigation started with a report to the district’s fraud hotline.

In it, a Jewish student alleged that they were “not offered the same opportunities as the Ladies First club are such as being given money by the school to attend college trips and given lunches at club meetings.”

The Ladies First is a club that emphasizes leadership for young Black women at East High School.

The anonymous tipster also claimed the club had over spent by $8,000 on “college bootcamp retreats” that Principal Terita Walker covered by taking “funds from another club that had a positive balance to cover the First Ladies club deficit.”

The reporting student also complained that the club used a cash app on social media to request donations, “while other clubs are told that they can only use My School Bucks to collect money.”

The district does not have a formal policy prohibiting cash apps, according to the report.

Neither the former student who created the cash app account in May 2023 nor the club sponsor, Ariel Ruempolhamer, the school’s Community and Family Engagement Coordinator, provided statements for “a full accounting of what was collected or where the monies were spent, transferred or deposited,” according to the internal audit.

“The sponsor indicated that she is not an authorized signer of the First Ladies club 501c3 bank account, she does not have access to the Booster Club’s money, and she has not created any personal cash app nor has she collected any money tied to the First Ladies club or any other club on any cash app,” the report said.

The $565 was collected in three transactions intended to help the costs associated with college visits for the club’s members.

Little else is known.

Everything else was redacted.

During a board finance and audit meeting last week, Director Scott Esserman asked about the scope of the financial losses for three cases that were referred to the district’s HR and legal departments.

Craig Ramsey, an internal audit manager, declined to say.

“Since they become personnel issues and confidential reports, I think this is probably all I will say about that,” Ramsey said.

The cases were anonymously reported on the district’s hotline, a tool both employees and the public can use to report suspected fraud, waste or abuse of district assets, as well as fiscal misconduct.

Misuse or misappropriation of public assets accounted for about 5% of hotline calls last school year.

“HR, Diversity & Workplace Respect” was the category with the single most complaints.

The briefing to the board last week provided top-level data on fraud complaints, but no insights into the type of reports likely to be found valid or invalid nor details on problematic cases, such as those that lacked information or were found inconclusive.

DPS has used the hotline for six years.