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[Updated, 8 p.m.] Today is a potential field day for document hounds: The Nutter administration has followed through on its promise to publish the boxload of documents that the School District agreed to provide to the city and state as part of the educational accountability agreement signed on June 9.

The mayor’s office has created a dedicated web page for the documents. As of 3:30 p.m., not all the links on the page were functioning. Some are enormous files that are slow to open.

“This trove of documents provides insight into the School District’s operations and financial condition,” mayoral spokesperson Mark McDonald said.

“We’ve requested supplemental documents,” he added, “basically to make sure we understand what these documents mean.”

One document request with which the District appeared not to fully comply was for a current and proposed organizational chart, showing all departments and their heads before and after budget cuts. Post-reductions, the chart identifies only the top dozen deputies of Superintendent Arlene Ackerman and does not indicate which departments survived or were eliminated.

Another set of document requests was responsive to frequent public demands for greater transparency about contracting out of services; the District’s 34-page list of professional services contracts and a list of its construction contracts.

High salaries for administrators have been another area of public concern during the current budget crisis, and the documents include a five-page list of non-instructional staff who earned $90,000 or more as of June. It reveals that in June there were 10 District employees who earn more than the mayor’s annual salary of $167,440 (though three of those have since left their posts). The superintendent leads the way at $348,140.

Also included are a number of documents relating to District employment contracts. One, according to a District spokesperson, was included by mistake: The incomplete document spells out the terms of a proposed contract amendment for Superintendent Ackerman that would have put her deferred $100,000 retention bonus into a trust, offered her another $150,000 retention bonus next June 30, added five vacation days, and provided her health benefits for life at no cost.

“That amendment is an old draft document that is no longer under discussion,” the District said in a statement.

The documents are broken out into seven key areas, and a final section is devoted to the agreement itself. Some sections have numerous documents. The sections are:

1. Financial oversight – details on all sources of funds and how they are spent.
2. Title 1 funding - details on how the District spends this federal funding
3. Programming – evaluations of District programs
4. Facilities – facilities master plan
5. Vendor issues - lists of all service providers
6. Personnel – District organizational chart
7. Senior staff issues - employment contracts and evaluations

We encourage readers to use the comments and let us know what you find.

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