GUSD’s $8,450 DVD that never was

By: Linda Gross

A contract to develop a DVD intended to promote the Globe School District was given to Tom Leach, Eyes of a Child, who appears to have sub’d it out to a highschool student and was of such poor quality, the District never used it. This may have just been written up as a lesson in what not to do – had it not been for the fact that Leach was paid $8,450 for the job…and after such a dismal result, still received contracts for his services which amounted to nearly $300,000 over 3 years.

This is just one of many findings by an independent audit review(see below), recently released, involving Globe’s Superintendent of Schools, Timothy Trent and John Marquez, Supervisor of Facilities. Both men had been placed on home assignment last June and not allowed on the GUSD campus, as the School Board brought in independent auditors to look into financial, procurement and human resource records for the period of July 2006 through June 2009.

As you may recall, Timothy Trent was hired as the Superintendent of Globe Unified School District in 2003, and in 2005 married Daisy Flores the Gila County County Attorney. The marriage created a powerful force. One which reportedly contributed to a reticence by those involved to come forward earlier. Flores has adamantly denied any undue influence. It seems though, some still insist that her position as both wife and County Attorney played into their decision not to speak up.

The entire Audit Report may be found on

Bill Taylor’s website: gila101.9.

Some of the summary statements and recommendations found in the report include:

(1) A recommendation, “that because of improprieties of procurement and other possible violations of ARS this should be sent to the Auditor General office and Attorney Generals’ office for investigative review.

(2) A summary statement pertaining to Human Resources, which says, ” Based on conversations with GUSD personnel, the Human Resource Director and documents provided by the District we have determined that an allegedly evasive, widespread and systematic form of harassment and the subsequent creation of a hostile work environment has been prevalent within the GUSD over the past several years.

NOTE: Arizona SilverBelt. reported recently that a class action lawsuit involving several teachers and administrators was filed in Gila County Court in September against Timothy Trent and Daisy Flores.

(3) As a result of Dr. Trent appointing himself as GUSD Business Manager (Chief Financial Officer) on September 24, 2008 and October 8, 2008… and assuming responsibilities for cash management and completion reports…has led to the degrading of the entire GUSD Human Resource, Procurement and Financial Systems.

Without a highly competent business manager who will adhere to USFR and other legal and administrative rules and regulations the District, in our opinion, has either lost or abused many hundred’s of thousands of dollars over a short period of time.

Just recently, Flores’ office sent out a press release (posted on gila101.9) detailing, what they say are corrections to one of the allegations in the Audit: (1) That after her husband Trent requested an early voter list of individuals who voted in the May 2007 override and was denied access by Linda Haught-Ortega, Bryan Chambers and Rob Miller with the County Attorney’s office came to argue the issue in support of release, and when this didn’t result in a release of documents, that she had a visit by Flores herself who concurred with Ortega that the statute precluded the use to which Trent had stated. The press statement issued by Bryan Chambers, argues that Ortega came to him for advice on the matter. Not the other way around. And noted that Rob Miller was not actually on the County Attorney’s payroll at that time (it would be another 2.5 months before he was actually put on the payroll), but it does not deny that Trent requested the documents, nor does it broach the subject of the intent of such a request.

Chamber states that even after being denied access, Trent visited his office to “re-urge” his request. The Audit goes on to say that they were told by the Gila County Recorder she had received calls from teachers that worked for the District asking “if Dr. Trent could find out how they voted?” She said they called her office “in fear that Dr. Trent could tell how they voted.” Others at the District office voiced the same concern to our consultants.

Perhaps, in addition to counseling the County Recorder on her right to withhold records, Flores might also have counseled her husband on the efficacy of his request in the first place.

The Audit goes on to outline other connections with the County Attorney’s office, backed up by the recent press release :

Rob Thompson, who you’ll recall from the latest press release by the County Attorney’s office, worked 19 hours as a part time Deputy Gila County Attorney from August of ’07 to February of ’08, and then turned up at Globe Unified School District as the Assistant Principal at the High School with a salary of $67,000 although he did not hold an Arizona Administrative Certificate. Miller went on to actually received a total of $129,431.99 during one and a half year period – mostly from consulting to the District.

When Liz Atilano informed Dr. Trent that Rob Thompson did not hold an administrator certificate, Trent told her to just put his position down as Dean of Students.

Another favorite son of both the CA’s office and the District, appears to have been Timothy Leach who operated under his own name, and his business known as “From the Eyes of  a Child” and a business known as ” Through the Eyes of a Child.” Leach had originally been an employee of the District in ’05, but resigned in October of ’05 and reappeared as an independent contractor in January of ’06. Leach was paid a total of $293,357.07 by the District over 3 years. He also worked for the County Attorney’s office according to the Board of Supervisor’s minutes.

During his stint at GUSD, he was paid $8,450 to produce a DVD which Leach said said he was well qualified to produce, having done so for another client. However, it seems he passed the work off, as he confirms in the audit, the DVD was “100% done by a high school senior” and despite such a large investment by the District, not one copy was ever published or put on the website. Nor was it easy to find any copies. The reviewers did finally track down one copy and their report states ” the poor quality of the DVD would indicate it was not used.”

Leach won the contract to do this DVD in a bid process which included a bid by now acting CPA Dean, Tamara Gilinski who says she has only bid on one contract with the District (an AIMS contract), so how her name and bid appeared on the DVD ( TamaraGalinskiDVD ) is….well, a mystery at this point. (Her name shows up as a bidder on other Leach contracts, alas to no avail. Leach goes on to win each contract, even after he turns in one bid past the 5pm cut off.)

In another PO for $28,600, Dr. Trent directed a GUSD employee to advertise the RFP in the Payson paper – not one of general circulation in the area. The published dates of the RFP were within 5 days of each other, failing to meet the minimum standard of 14 days to allow bidders sufficient time to participate. Low and Behold, there was only one proposal for this contract, that being From the Eyes of a Child and the Board approved RFP 29-23-13 with a cap of $75,000. Tom Leach was paid 75,000 under this RFP “without any paramenters. Invoices did not reflect days or hours worked.”