21 Comments
Apr 4, 2023Liked by Tom Hayden

Damn nice work.

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Apr 11, 2023Liked by Tom Hayden

Your work has made the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Our board president’s comment on your post.

“Everything that the media, the public has perceived has been consulted with our attorneys,” DaCosta said. “And as far as we know at this point, those are just allegations.”

I am not sure how FOIA’d documents are just allegations, but that is me!

https://www.ajc.com/education/dekalb-superintendent-finalist-a-polarizing-figure-in-current-district/LHD5L5S2ZBFKFO6R2RWBOX2K2Q/

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author

Woah thanks for sharing! Its a well written story; sounds like your board members (well Mr. DaCosta at least) already had his mind made up. “These are just allegations” is a familiar tune..

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author

Shipping Containers and Dr. Horton Shipped off

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Apr 5, 2023Liked by Tom Hayden

I am a DeKalb parent and found your posts. I have forwarded them to a local reporter. I am concerned as our district has been through the ringer since 2019 and are on our 4th superintendent. Two of those are still on our payroll & will continue to be even with the new person because of board shenanigans and lawsuit settlements so we are all skeptical of anything the board does or who they may recommend. We are a HUGE district and these posts surface operation issues we already have with our central office. Are you on social media?

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author

Oh wow that sounds like a level of corruption and mismanagement that he will fit right in with. I am not on social media, this is it but please share any of my posts. I have more stories coming on Dr. Horton that I havent published yet

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Apr 5, 2023Liked by Tom Hayden

Please DO NOT. We will deny this. Until his contract is signed.

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Apr 5, 2023Liked by Tom Hayden

Nothing to see here, Tracy. I"m sure all of his mismanagement and self-dealing in Evanston has all been a misunderstanding. You all will love Horton. Please ink his contract. Quickly.

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Apr 8, 2023·edited Apr 8, 2023

Georgia is a absolutely beautiful and amazing state its one of the few places I would consider moving too the people are amazing. This is really too bad for it

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Are they aware of the lawsuit he’s currently apart of from the department of education office of civil rights violations ? Amazing that anyone would hire him. Personally I wonder if somethings about to happen in that case that he knows about

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No. Are there any links about it?

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author
Apr 6, 2023·edited Apr 6, 2023Author

This is quite a complicated story; I'm going to write on this soon but I'm waiting for a response to some FOIAs from the Dept of Ed. Here's the document that Jimmy mentioned:

https://files.foiagras.com/Letter-of-Finding.pdf

Essentially, in Jan 2021, the Dept of Ed Civil Rights division sent a letter of finding to D65 regarding some pretty serious violations of the law. It was written by a career employee at DoE, not some partisan hack. However, the letter was never finished and was officially cancelled by the DoE and the Biden Administration without really any rationale.

Edit: I should add- many of these violations actually did not happen during Dr. Horton's tenure. Most of the offenses happened in 2018-19, before he came to Evanston. However, he's basically taken ownership and used the very offenses for political gain ("Look at how I am being victimized" kind of stuff)

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Just don’t email Horton or he’ll arrest you without ever responding

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author

What? I email him all the time with requests for quotes, etc.

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deletedApr 7, 2023·edited Apr 7, 2023
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Update - the container is still at Willard!

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author

I saw that YESTERDAY and was like WHAT THE HELL!

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Wow, I didn't realize Horton had filed for bankruptcy twice?!! And then Hernandez saying the board knew about it before the hire and didn't care about it?!?! No wonder they decided to keep the hire from the public!

Kudos to the Atlanta Journal Constitution for this article. Imagine if something like this were published before Horton was hired in Evanston??!

The only question now is whether the DeKalb County school board is as feckless as Evanston's!

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author

Yeah, he filed for bankruptcy in 2006 and 2015. The 2006 was is very sketchy and was due to something that looks like mortgage fraud. I'm not sure if the board is legally allowed to consider that in hiring him or not, though. I'll have to look into it. I've been debating writing a story on the bankrupcy but bigger fish to fry, as they say.

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It looked like to me on a phone that your footnote was cut off. That aside, it is more important than ever to keep watch over this Board. After all, they picked the man who stated looking for his next job the day he arrived. God only knows what closed door efforts they will engage in to hire the next. Vigilance is key- we are talking about OUR money and OUR kids. The financial ethics or lack thereof) is one thing- we can’t buy back health. The hypocrisy of this town vis-a-vis black and brown health standards and good environmental citizenry is not surprising or lost on me.

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