"As PERB has not yet taken action, this court must defer to SDCOE's designation and any evidence offered by plaintiff must be disregarded.
Therefore, plaintiff is a management level employee such that section 4114 does not apply and summary judgment is granted on this basis."
Diane Crosier and Lora Duzyk, executives at San Diego County Office of Education, have been dismissed from Rodger Hartnett's lawsuit because they say that Rodger Hartnett was a management employee, and the court must take their word for it.
Top employees at the San Diego County Office of Education have been allowed to avoid reporting gifts despite a California law that is supposed to ensure that the public can peek at who is paying for meals, handing out baseball tickets or giving other gifts to influential government employees...
The Fair Political Practices Commission urged the County Office of Education to change its guidelines after being alerted to the issue by voiceofsandiego.org earlier this month. Depending on how long the office has failed to report gifts, its employees may need to report gifts they received years ago. Office spokesman Jim Esterbrooks said the agency is updating its guidelines to comply.
Gifts have played a role in a contentious lawsuit filed by a former employee that alleges free meals contributed to a "culture of corruption" at the agency that steered County Office of Education business to specific law firms.
For instance, employees who help oversee legal work for school districts regularly accepted free lunches from an attorney who is frequently hired by their department, according to testimony by employee John Vincent taken as part of the lawsuit. Attorney Dan Shinoff usually paid for the meals, which happened more than once a month, Vincent said.
Diane Crosier, who directs the office's risk management department, was one of the employees that accepted the meals, according to the testimony. Her department controls millions of dollars in legal work for school districts across the county. While Crosier does not decide which attorneys to assign to each legal case, she oversees Rick Rinear, the worker who does. Rinear also went to lunch with Shinoff from time to time, along with other employees, Vincent said in the deposition this year.
Crosier is required to reveal her economic interests to the public because she helps make decisions with a financial impact for a public agency. The County Office of Education does not require Rinear or the other employees to do so.
California law typically requires employees like Crosier to reveal gifts worth $50 or more from a single source annually, so frequent free lunches would likely need to be reported.
Yet Crosier did not report any lunches with Shinoff. VOSD sought to learn why Crosier hadn't revealed the lunches and learned that the office does not require most of its employees to report gifts.
That makes it impossible for the public to gauge whether Crosier or other office employees are getting gifts that could compromise their objectivity.
Accepting the gifts also appears to violate a County Office of Education regulation that states that no employee should accept personal gifts from people or companies selling services or supplies to the public agency, except for promotional items like calendars that everyone gets for free...
The former employee who is suing the County Office of Education, Rodger Hartnett, specifically names Shinoff's firm, Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz, as one that got work "based on personal relationships" and not merit. The firm was paid nearly $7 million between 2002 and 2008, dwarfing other firms...
Hartnett himself testified that Shinoff also gave him lunches, golf games and baseball tickets. He also said he got dinner and free concert tickets from Randy Winet, an attorney from another firm hired by the agency...
[Maura Larkins note: Dan Shinoff was assigned to represent Peg Myers and Robin Donlan in one of many cases orchestrated by Diane Crosier of SDCOE.]
Photo: Lora Duzyk (left) is San Diego County Office of Education's Assistant Superintendent for Business Services.
Who is profiting from inflated insurance premiums in San Diego schools? Perhaps just about everyone involved in school liability insurance.
Sometimes my commenters know more than I do about a subject, and school insurance is one of those subjects. A recent comment caused me to do some research. I already knew that the San Diego County Office of Education-Joint Powers Authority was paying millions of tax dollars each years for lawyers who cover up wrongdoing in schools. I didn't know how far up (or down) the corruption went.
Following New York's lead, Santa Clara County is suing several top insurance brokerage firms, claiming they have duped customers out of millions through secret "kickbacks" and other "lucrative" service deals.
"It's almost cartel-like," said the county's outside counsel, Louise Renne, a for-mer San Francisco city attorney who wasbrought on board because of her extensive experience with this type of litigation. "We believe that every public agency in the state of California has been affected."
In a complaint filed in Alameda County Superior Court in November, Santa Clara is alleging that industry giants Marsh & McLennan Cos., Driver Alliant Insurance Service and Keenan & Associates are "steering" clients toward insurers that are offering brokers undisclosed commissions, funded through insurance premiums.
"In the end," the complaint alleges,"clients paid more for less insurance, with defendants siphoning off the difference to pad their bottom line..."
Here is part of what my commenter wrote:
"...Three insurance brokers namely Driver Alliant, Keenan and Associates and Marsh & McLennan manage these super pools. These insurance brokers are being sued in Alameda County where the allegations are for unlawful business practices, in violation of California Business and Profession Code section 17200 et. seq. false and misleading advertisement where they cream millions of dollars in public funds in violation of Business and Profession Government Code Section 17500 et. seq., breach of fiduciary duty, illegal and secret kickbacks, steering premium dollars and getting public agencies to purchase services at high rates.
"...Keenan and Associates has a “HYBRID SELF-INSURANCE and REINSURANCE” [SDCOE has SELF-JPA where Keenan is also a member of this “Super Pool”] pooling program for nearly 400 schools and community colleges.
"Keenan advertised for its Super Pool’s conference at Lake Tahoe as, “The Pudding is in the Pooling,” in their invitations. Yes, the pudding is good, they are raking in Millions of PUBLIC FUNDS through their billable hours...
"Daniel Shinoff and his SASH firm takes the cream of the Southern District billable hours for BOTH Keenan and SELF which are brokered by Marsh & McLennan. The premium billable hours are steered to his firm with the blessing of Keenan, SELF and Diane Crosier.
"Keenan and Marsh and McLennan as the agents of California’s public entities have a fiduciary duty to recommend the best coverage at the best price for its clients. They are to provide independent, objective advice, and to put ‘their clients best interests’ ahead of their own. Keenan and Driver and Marsh and McLennan are hired to act as consulting, billing/premium administration, and claims administration. Their duty is to provide full disclosure, candor, and loyalty. Disclose the amounts of income; Contingent Commissions Agreements and remuneration they receive form all transactions to the public agencies they represent. Keenan has a policy where every employee, associate and partner has to belong to several churches, golf clubs, non-profit organizations and civic groups. This is how they create friendships with judges, political figures, churches and organizations who look the other way. While attorneys like Daniel Shinoff bully public boards into contractual agreements and decisions that are not in the best interest of PUBLIC AGENCIES but bring in a lot of billable hours to his firm and bigger premiums for insurance Brokers and JPA’s.
"The agreements that the PUBLIC AGENCIES get pressured into signing with the JPA’s have different names like: “Contingent Income Agreements” “Production Service Agreements” “Volume Based Commission Agreements” “Profit-Sharing Commission Agreements” “Commission Override Agreements” Premium Value Contingent Commission Agreements” “Preferred Agency Agreements” and “Platinum Profit Sharing Agreements.”
"These commissions create a blatant CONFLICT of INTEREST and a direct financial interest for these brokers, JPA’s and preferred law firms. These commission and preferred agreements cause CONFLICT of INTEREST, along with premium prices in many cases with lower benefits. The insurance companies recoup the kickbacks paid to marsh & Marsh and McLennan, Keenan and Driver by higher insurance prices passed on to the public agencies. Whereby, suppressing competition in the market of insurance.
"This is the reason why the PUBLIC AGENCIES in San Diego cannot get insurance apart from the JPA’s. No insurance company can do business in California without belonging to one of the three “insurance brokers.” The insurance brokers have contractual agreements with certain JPA’s; like SDCOE SELF and these JPA use the same law firms they have contractual agreements with like Best Best and Krieger, Stutz, Artiano, Shinoff and Holtz “SASH” and Winet..."
(End of quote of commenter to this blog.)
It turns out that insurance companies were doing a lot of harm long before they helped bring down the US economy in 2008 with their credit default derivatives. The derivatives were too complicated and clever by half, a scheme to get rich quick while promising that there would be no consequences. The government failed to regulate these scams, pretending they weren't really insurance policies. Institutions began to fail once it was discovered that the institutions didn't have any protection against defaults because they were unknowingly insuring themselves.
Many local school districts belong to the San Diego County Office of Education-JPA. Diane Crosier is the Executive Director of the SDCOE-JPA, and she works under the direction of SDCOE Superintendent Randolph Ward and Asst. Supt. Lora Duzyk. Crosier represents the SDCOE-JPA at a bigger JPA called SELF.
Diane Crosier then goes on to represent SELF when the other JPAs come together to form what it is called a “super pool,” then she reports back (delivers instructions) to SELF and SDCOE-JPA (which she herself directs).
This complete circle leaves me wondering who is in charge, the people at the bottom or the people at the top? There is some evidence that the person in charge is Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz attorney Daniel Shinoff, whom Diane Crosier most often selects to represent school districts in San Diego.
All tentative rulings heard on April 9, 2010 were finalized.
The judge didn't give any litigant everything he wanted without a trial. Judge Styn made the following Tentative Rulings:
1. Dan Puplava will have to answer for unfair competition, but not conversion or interference. LINK
2. Puplava motion for summary judgment denied: "Puplava fails to cite authority providing for summary adjudication of whether a duty was breached. Absent such authority, there is no basis to summarily adjudicate the claims for breach of duty as requested by Puplava. Even if there was such authority, Puplava's separate statement fails to identify the specific breach of duty and the undisputed facts as to each breach of duty for which summary adjudication is sought.
3. Triable issues of fact remain re Puplava's damages. LINK
4. Judge Styn kept alive the Breach of Written Contract charge against the Consortium as well as Breach of Contract, Interference and Unfair Competition against Crosier. He threw out Breach of Oral/Implied Contract against the Consortium. LINK
5. Click HERE for Tentative Ruling concerning the following: 1. Breach of Contract--Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is granted. 2. Furtahdo wins: Breach of Implied Contract--Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is granted. 3. Misappropriation of Trade Secret--Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is denied. 4. Statutory Libel--Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is denied. 5. Intentional Interference with Prospective Economic Advantage Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is denied. 6. Misappropriation of Name--Defendants' motion for summary adjudication is denied.
The judge did not favor the big dogs as blatantly as he did in Maura Larkins' malpractice lawsuit against attorney Elizabeth Schulman. In a better world, Judge Styn would have forwarded the evidence in the Schulman case to the Bar Association. Instead, he ignored it (helping Elizabeth Schulman avoid all responsibility for her wrongful acts), and then punished Maura Larkins financially for bringing the lawsuit.
The decisions of the court in the Schulman case illustrate why Elizabeth Schulman felt confident that she could get away with violating the legal requirements for an attorney who agrees to represent a client. Schulman possessed sworn testimony that contradicted the testimony of the witnesses appearing for Chula Vista Elementary School District. Why did she not present it? Judge Styn’s prejudices against in pro per litigants not only protected Schulman from any legal consequences for her wrongdoing, but caused him to dismiss with prejudice a case in which the complaint itself contained enough evidence to prove Schulman guilty of the causes of action against her.
Below is a tidbit from Scott Dauenhauer about what's going on with Dan Puplava and Diane Crosier's lawsuit against San Diego County Office of Education's former financial advisors.
Attorney Dan Shinoff refused to show up for his own deposition by me on November 8, 2007, and for another deposition scheduled in 2008, yet he wants to depose Scott Dauenhauer for a third day! He can dish it out, but he can't take it. Perhaps Mr. Shinoff was afraid that he wouldn't be able to perform as well as his partner Ray Artiano. See Mr. Artiano's deposition HERE. The Teacher Advocate Monday, January 11, 2010
Remember This [San Diego Union-Tribune] Story - Puplava and FBC
I am reposting the link to this story mainly because the FBC has decided that two days of deposing me is not enough.
They are pissed at my involvement in the story behind the scenes and have chosen to subpoena all sorts of stuff. They even made what could only be taken as a threat to sue me in the last deposition (they meaning Dan Shinoff, the FBC attorney). The FBC is suing the former advisors and those advisors are countersuing the FBC. I am not being sued, just deposed....yet!
The price you pay for standing up for the little guy I guess. I wonder how much taxpayer money is being spent on this lawsuit?
Scott Dauenhauer CFP, MSFP, AIF Posted by Meridian Wealth Management
