Installment 9 - The Riddle of The Stinks

Preface to Installment

as of Wednesday August 21 at 4 am PDT:

This Installment was first posted on the afternoon of August 19, and immediately resulted in sources coming forward with additional documents and information. We have now added that first burst of extra material to the posting. If you've already read this Installment, please take a spin through it again! Look for some particularly scurrilous e-mails and more financial docs that were not in the original posting.

Also, we have now been allowed to identify the person inside that Poor Little Turtle Named Mack.  

It is clear that this Installment is inspiring people to step up and relieve themselves of guilty knowledge. Earlier today we got off the phone with someone who was at the very highest level of the California State University and wanted to unburden about rampant and orchestrated fraud with respect to CSULB donations and fundraising under President F. King Alexander (since July the President/Chancellor of LSU where we believe him to be up to his old tricks, the same tricks he and his father first tested at Murray State University). 

The THUG editors are presently analyzing the new information (and documents that are now in hand) and will decide whether we add this to the end of this Installment or publish a new Installment. So, please check back for updates over the next few days!

And thank you. Keep it coming and keep it real.

Installment 9:

Answer this riddle, and all the glories of the Universe shall be yours: What walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, but lies like a rug?

In the 1980's, Samuel Maxwell Kern Alexander Jr. (whom we call "Kern") came up with a sure-fire, money-makin', headline-grabbin' business model.

It was a beaut really, what you might call "an angle" or maybe "a hook", ostensibly a win-win-win-win-win for everybody concerned, with the biggest winnings reserved for himself, his forever-friend-lawyer-business-partner Theodore H. "Ted" Lavit, and Kern's brother David Alexander.

The angle? 

"Educational ambulance chasing".

What Kern and Ted did (with David sometimes in tow) was barnstorm through Kentucky from top to bottom, soliciting school boards -- member by member and district by district -- to sue the State and claim there had been an unequal distribution of school financing from the Commonwealth's coffers. 

It was an easy sales job, since Kern had already made himself a living off of Federal and State grants to compile education finance data from all 50 States, so he and his pals were in a unique position to breeze into the poorest school districts, show them how screwed they were, and announce that only The Alexander Crew could save the day. Not unlike the vacuum cleaner salesman who dumps a can of soot on your rug the instant you let him in.

Because, well, it works: you always let the salesman suck up the soot once he's made the mess, and don't that carpet gleam better'n new once's he's done!

So, are we sayin' that The Alexander Crew sold these school board folks on the need for these lawsuits as a moral stand for cleaner carpets and the absolute betterment of the community?

Please. We are talkin' 'bout The Alexanders here. The only thing they think is good is whatever pads their wallets.

In return for The Alexander Crew's initiative, they didn't just charge hourly legal fees and out-of-pocket costs, they asked the school districts to pre-commit to paying them a per student cash amount. More districts, more students, more income without having to do any additional work. After all, in the end this was just one big suit in Kentucky. Could've had one pint-sized ninth grader as the lone Plaintiff and achieved the same result. 'Course, that would've cut into the profitability of the matter for The Alexander Crew. Instead, with lots of Plaintiffs, Kern and Ted and David could farm out the actual legal work to a law firm, while The Alexander Crew collected its cut and moved on to solicit suits in other States. 

Meanwhile, Kern would earn himself extra added reward as the expert analyst and expert witness for what would become impressive, law-changing litigation.

Sah-weet.

In the end, the Kentucky Supreme Court agreed that there was indeed an inequitable distribution of school funds, Kern got great renown as the resident expert in all this, and the legislature hurried and crafted The Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1988.

Now jumpcut.

Any of you reading this have any predictions as to the results of Reform?

The results were in by the mid-1990's. 

Yes, the distribution of funds had been corrected: poor districts were now getting funds equal to richer districts, the per student revenues were finally equal.

BUT, test scores, graduation rates, the numbers of students moving on to college -- that is, all the indicia of student and educational success -- were no better or even worse than back in the days of inequality. And this despite the fact that the economy was up and all school districts were getting way more money than before.

What in the world had happened?

The answer should have been apparent to you when we referenced how The Alexander Crew played Harold Hill to all those nice folks on the school boards.

No offense, but the only folks who really know how to run a school are teachers, and even they can't be trusted if they are paid and empowered as full-time managers rather than teachers.

Because the moment you bring in "managers" -- non-teaching administrators -- it's no longer a school, it's a business, an institution whose mission becomes self-perpetuation rather than education.

So all the new and balanced Reform money flowed into all those Kentucky schools, and, instead of hiring more and better teachers (which we all agree is the only way to improve education), the administrators hired more administrators.

That's the truth. The administration of the Kentucky schools burgeoned -- more people being paid more money to spend money on themselves -- and the classroom was ignored. So the admin got rich and the students got poorer, albeit in a more equalized distribution of educational failure.

And the one guy who publicly prognosticated this was none other than Fieldon King Alexander, son of Kern.

Actually, better to say that he agreed with the more learned theorists who had already long prognosticated this.

In his PhD dissertation at the University of Wisconsin in 1996, King Alexander gathered data to confirm the prediction of others that increases in government-sponsored student aid would only result in increased tuition and costs.

Sort of like nature abhorring a vacuum. (Yet another use of vacuums in this discussion.) Add money to public education, and costs go up; the added money doesn't buy more, it buys less; the added money is sucked right in to greedy grubby grabby mitts and disappears with no benefit to the educational mission. The sad and ugly truth of the mentality of public education is that everyone there feels underpaid and overworked, but the folks who gravitate into the administration rather than the classroom have a very real sense of entitlement and "due". And those are folks you don't leave alone with an envelope full of unmarked bills, let alone unallocated bucket funding from taxpayers.

But, jumpcut again, if you please.

At both Murray State University in Kentucky and California State University Long Beach, The King quickly increased the size and cost of the administration (he would wind up tripling it at CSULB during his time there), whether he had State funding or not. In fact, during the recession of the last few years, he relied on his own dissertation findings and pushed for increases in tuition and student fees to cover his administrative excesses, even as he cut courses and teachers and access to majors. At the nadir of the recession, administrators were handed raises and guaranteed three year contracts, more administrative posts were added and filled, but the teachers were furloughed and class meetings cancelled so students received even less while paying more, and teachers found themselves suddenly earning less than a living wage in light of their everyday financial obligations.

It was a nightmare for students and teachers, but a boom time for administrators. 

And, as previously quoted in THUG, Alexander and his head of finance famously took the position that "in times of recession, there need to be more and higher-paid administrators to figure out how to make do with less".

The King had come full circle in his thinking. No matter the revenue -- whether it was up or down -- you still HAD to increase the size of the administration and up the pay to administrators. The most critical part of a university was no longer students and faculty, it was management.

This is The King that Louisiana's Governor Bobby Jindal recruited, and this is why This King was recruited.

What The King doesn't seem to grasp -- and that's because he's not the forward-thinking chess player that Jindal is -- is that once you gut the classroom costs (hello, on-line learning!), you will then finally get around to cutting back on administration as well, and the days of Pretend Kings will be done.

But, for the moment and the next few years, it pays and pays well to be Quisling.

And, in this moment, what's the key to survival if you are King Alexander? Having no soul may be a start, but what's the quantifiable credential that makes Bobby wink with delight?

Privatization.

The privatization of public education.

With the first step being donations.

It is fair to say that King Alexander got the gig at LSU because he claimed to be a vastly good fundraiser. Indeed, he laid claim to having brought in the single biggest donation in CSULB history, money used immediately to subsidize the tuition of students who would not otherwise have been able to stay in school.

But, as you are about to see -- SPOILER ALERT! -- these claims were all lies, and not just puffery for the press but actionable, fraudulent statements signed under penalty of perjury and submitted to California State authorities. Lies on papers, lies in public testimony, lies lie lies.

Here then, that tale of woes and shmoes.

The late Bob Cole was a wildly successful real estate broker and real estate mogul in Long Beach. His name was on bus benches all over town. That was the public Bob Cole.

Privately, Bob Cole was an amateur pianist (meaning he owned a fine piano and played for a captive audience of family and friends at home), and, although he had no academic tie to CSULB and no reported academic accomplishments anywhere, he was long courted for his money by CSULB College of The Arts Dean Donald Para, who'd been Chair of the Music Department for many years prior to his Deanship. Para and his development people were determined that Cole would be the big fish donor they would land to meet and exceed their fundraising quotas, and Cole dangled that likelihood seductively, enjoying the chase.

An honorable man and well-intended, Cole died in 2004 before making the big donation, but the Widow Cole led Para to believe that massive money would be forthcoming from the estate, so much money that the Music Department should be re-named in Cole's honor.

As of 2006, when Fieldon King Alexander became President of CSULB, Para and his people were still pursuing the Widow Cole and the elusive donation. Alexander now got his development people on the case, and over the course of many many months, they negotiated terms.

To re-name an academic entity -- in this case, to turn the CSULB Music Department into the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music -- one must follow a substantive set of policies and procedures established by the CSU Chancellor and the CSU Board of Trustees. 

With respect to procedure, the approval of the campus President is only the beginning. Also needed is approval of the Executive Committee of the Academic Senate for that campus. 

Next the proposal and petition go to the Vice Chancellor for University Advancement at the CSU Chancellor's Office (in this case a gentleman named Richard West), and he convenes a Review Panel consisting of himself, plus the Executive Vice Chancellor and Chief Academic Officer for the CSU, plus the President of a campus (appointed by the Chancellor), plus the Chair of the Statewide Academic Senate, and the President of the campus that is submitting the naming request (in this case, King Alexander). 

After review and recommendation by each member of the Panel, the Vice Chancellor for University Advancement presents the request to the Chancellor. If the Chancellor approves, a brief is prepared for inclusion on the agenda of the Committee on Institutional Advancement of the Board of Trustees for the CSU. The matter is then taken up as a resolution, presented (in this case, by West and by Alexander), and voted on by the Committee during a Board of Trustees meeting.

At each procedural step above, the following issues for review are repeated, considered, validated, and justified in order for the proposal to move forward: (i) the naming "shall honor an individual or organization", (ii) the naming shall "honor significant contributors of funds", and (iii) each level of review and finally the Board of Trustees shall "take into consideration the significance and amount of the proposed current gift and future potential giving with regard to academic prestige and recognition of the proposed college, school, program, center, or institute".

In other words, unless you are naming the school after Mozart, there must be present monetary value conferred, and even then there must be propriety. This isn't a commercial sale or licensing, there must be academic gravitas or at least respect that the public and other donors would recognize. By the same token, without present monetary value to the campus and the CSU, there is no naming. 

In this case, amateur pianist and professional realtor Bob Cole's weight was purely dollars and sense.

To give you some idea of what kind of dollars would be relevant, Alexander and his team often cited to a rule which would augur for approval of re-naming a building if a donation was being made in an amount equal to the original construction cost of that building, and even the oldest and most asbestos-filled buildings on the CSULB campus had original construction costs at 7 figures. Therefore, when it came to re-naming an entire academic entity (not merely a building), the present dollar donation would need to be 7 figures and more, and the balance of the donation would need to be vastly more.

In order to live up to these requirements of scholarly importance and cash on the barrelhead, Alexander announced in January 2008 that the Bob Cole donation would be a total of 16.4 million dollars, the largest donation in CSULB history. This donation would be in the form of both endowment and cash. The endowment would be 15.2 million dollars of trust properties and funds, handed over to the University, and 1.2 million dollars in current cash to be used immediately to fund Music students for the costs of their matriculation, dubbing them "Bob Cole Scholars". 

The intent of the Cole donation would be to subsidize all incoming (and current) music students. 

And the immediacy of this donation was absolutely critical as the economic recession was already awful and getting worse, driving up tuition wildly as State funding to the University was being slashed every semester. The phrase "trigger cuts" was used liberally during this time; and the oft-stated axiom with respect to the Cole donation was that, without this money, CSULB's music students would not otherwise be able to afford to stay in school, while new students would fail to materialize because they couldn't afford the new higher tuition. The Cole money would not merely be a game changer, it was the key to the Music Department's survival and the future of any son or daughter with musical talent.

That was the pitch Alexander and Para made everywhere they turned.

So, in January 2008, The King presented his detailed explanation of the Cole donation proposal to the Executive Committee of the Academic Senate of CSULB, Chaired by Dr. Praveen Soni, a savvy and politically tough defender of shared governance who was a thorn in Alexander's side. In order to get Soni's approval and the nods of the Executive Committee, The King emphasized the present value of the donation, with the promise that private money to the Music Department would immediately free up lots of public money for other departments. 

In fact, across the entire campus, the Music Department was second only to Athletics in the amount of Instructionally Related Activity (IRA) money it received every year from student fees, drawing about $200,000 each year to support the practical side of its programs. It is fair to say that no department in the College of The Arts could exist without IRA money to cover equipment, instruments, supplies, publications, exhibitions, performances, recitals, and student subsidies.

So, if Dr. Soni and the Executive Committee would just agree to the re-naming of the Music Department, at the very least the benefit for 2008 alone would be $200,000 in IRA money spread out to other worthy departments and programs that had been hit with cutbacks since the recession had begun. 

Additionally, in various venues, Alexander referenced a number of other CSULB donors who were interested in making "partial matching donations" once the Cole donation would be accepted. This translated into there being donors who were happy to sign checks, but only after someone else dipped their feet in the water first. Indeed, Alexander explained that other endowment funds could be freed up and new donations made to cover construction costs for structures such as a plaza and pavilion at what would be the Bob Cole Conservatory. But, none of this shining castle on a hill dreamy dream could come true unless the Bob Cole donation was accepted and the re-naming approved. 

This was therefore another one of those Alexander win-win-win-win-win situations that King and his family sold so well.

For Dr. Soni and the Executive Committee, this had become a no-brainer.  During Winter Break 2008 they met and approved the request; and the instant the semester began, on January 24, 2008, Dr. Soni sent confirmation to Alexander. 

That same day, Alexander put together the package of documents that confirmed the donation and the proposal and the approval from the Academic Senate, including Bob Cole's official biography for review, and The King hurried it all along to the Chancellor's Office, to the Vice Chancellor for University Advancement -- Richard West -- who would hastily convene the required Review Panel.

Excited by the promise of a huge donation (instant cash that could hedge against recession and looming cutbacks that very Spring, helping to keep students in school who would otherwise have to drop out and helping to keep enrollments up thereafter), and matching funds that would be both a practical and public relations coup, the members of the Panel each signed off on the proposal by individual FAX on or about February 25, 2008, recommending it on to the Chancellor, King's real life godfather Charles Reed. 

(An asterisk here: as you can see, the Panel consisted of Mr. Richard West, Dr. Gary Reichard, Mr. Barry Pasternack, Dr. James Rosser, and King Alexander. In responding to THUG's Public Records Act request for documents, the CSU insists it has provided us everything, but no signed ballot for Dr. Reichard has been shown us. Nonetheless, we are told the vote was unanimous approval. As readers of THUG know, Dr. Reichard was the CSULB Provost who lost the 2005 President's search to Alexander for reasons that were dubious at best and legally actionable at worst. As we go to press today, we do not know if Dr. Reichard voted or abstained or recused himself from the Cole matter. As soon as we find out, we will update our posting here.)

Of course, godfather Chancellor Reed approved the proposal, and it was then briefed by West for inclusion and presentation on the agenda of the Committee on Institutional Advancement to be heard at the March 11, 2008 meeting of the full CSU Board of Trustees. 

Knowing that they were merely counting days to a slam dunk, Alexander and his p.r. machine went on a full-court press (yes, we are mixing our basketball references), announcing the Cole donation to the world on March 7, days before the naming would be heard by the CSU Board of Trustees:

Finally, March 11 rolled around and the Board of Trustees met. There, West and Alexander took turns presenting the matter, clearly stating its terms on the record in order to prove that the relevant criteria had been satisfied: this would be a 1.2 million dollar instant cash donation to be used for music student subsidies in full over the next few years, plus another 15.2 million dollars of cash and property in trust to be invested, cashed out as needed, and used thereafter as continuing subsidies. Literally the forever future of CSULB's Music students would be covered by this gift. 

In return, the CSULB Music Department would be re-named, and the Widow Cole would receive a fancy printed and framed certificate from the Board.

It was a quid pro quo that could not be denied.

So, at the conclusion of the presentation by West and Alexander, the Board of Trustees passed the resolution, announced the huge donation as the largest in CSULB history, and took photos with the Widow Cole.

From the official published minutes of the March 11, 2008 meeting of the CSU Board of Trustees, here is Alexander's contribution to the proceedings, and the exciting conclusion:

In each and every appearance, speech, and interview thereafter (and there were many!), The King and Don Para both and each stated that the Bob Cole donation would immediately subsidize Bob Cole Scholars so that talented kids could afford to stay in school. 

Indeed, as the new academic year dawned in August 2008, The King and his people and Para boasted that the entire cohort of approximately 65 incoming music students was being subsidized in various amounts by Bob Cole cash money!

To keep the Cole donation atop the publicity burners as State funding dried up and private funding was needed to feed the bloated administration that Alexander created and Para seemed determined to maintain, each year since the Cole donation began The King has trotted out, showed off, and identified Bob Cole Scholar spokesmodels who were being subsidized for their matriculation at CSULB. 

By 2010, this poster Scholar thanked the late Bob Cole for the $20,000 the student was receiving during his years at CSULB:

And, as you might imagine, all the spokesmodels have repeated The King's meme: they could not have afforded to be in school were it not for the Bob Cole cash in hand.

Here then is this year's incarnation, made to testify to the Board of Trustees in January of this year, 2013, while The King was in the home stretch of his consideration for the gig at LSU and needed more public proof of his fundraising prowess:

Now, THUG knows what you're thinking. Didn't King himself predict that student aid would only lead to increased tuition? Yes, he did. And yes, he made it happen. He could have made in unhappen, but that wouldn't have been as personally profitable. So, as you've just seen, $3,400 in Cole money covered full tuition back in Academic Year 2008-09, but that number was up to 5K by 2010. And, it's all the higher today, as King and Para have each added campus-linked luxury fees over and above additionally increased tuition, even as they've cut classes and reduced the average of teaching salaries.

Circular inflation to bootstrap overripe egos, that's The King and His Court. If these guys get paid more, must be they are worth more. That's the logic. Impenetrable and impervious when they are the ones hiring and giving raises to themselves. 

By use of the Bob Cole donation, The King made himself worthy of the LSU job. 

Upward mobility, baby.

OK, back to our Cole saga. 

Once the donation and re-naming were announced by The King, he went hard after some of those matching funds donors, who did indeed step up, building the Bob Cole Plaza and Pavilion, inspired by the late realtor's generosity of heart and passion for music and music education. And, wouldn't you know it, all this just in time and confirmed by godfather Chancellor Charlie Reed for The King's run at the LSU gig.

Seriously, don't you just love it when a plan comes together? (Yes, THUG makes A-Team references, when appropriate.) 

Okay, now let's bust this hallucinogenic snowglobe in which the Alexanders live. You've just read all their press releases and carefully contrived fictions. You have read the testimony of Bob Cole Scholars who received Cold Cole Cash.

Right?

Wrong.

Remember we warned you at the very beginning of this Installment: THIS IS A STORY OF LIES LIES AND MORE LIES.

Remember our riddle?

Remember our SPOILER ALERT?

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck but lies like a rug, say hello to King Alexander!

HERE IS THUG'S VERDICT AS TO THE TRUTH, THE WHOLE TRUTH, AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH RE THE BOB COLE DONATION: 

IT'S BEEN FIVE YEARS AND EIGHT MONTHS SINCE THE KING ANNOUNCED THE BOB COLE DONATION AND ITS IMMEDIATE CASH FOR STUDENT SUBSIDIES, BUT THEN AND SINCE THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A SINGLE CENT OF ACTUAL BOB COLE MONEY. AND THE KING KNEW IT. HE KNEW IT THEN AND HE KNOWS IT NOW.

The whole thing was a lie, bait for other donors and a way for The King to feather his own nest, with Para covering his back. Lies spoken. Lies written. Lies signed for by The King. Lies made at official public hearings to trick Trustees and others into voting for what The King wanted.

Here's what really happened:

Thanks to The King's formal representations on paper and in public hearings, the Cole donation and re-naming was approved by all the levels of review as of March 2008. The other five departments in the College of The Arts -- Art, Dance, Design, Film and Electronic Arts, and Theatre -- had all been led to believe that, at the very least, they would now share in IRA money that would have gone to Music but which Music no longer needed thanks to the 1.2 million in Cole Cold Cash.

But, as Fall rolled around and IRA monies were being moved into accounts for spending, those five Other-Than-Music Departments saw only the most nominal increases.  For example, Design got $500 more, and Dance got $2,000 more; while Music -- the Bob Cole Conservatory itself -- was handed $16,500 MORE in IRA funds than the year before when there was no Bob Cole donation.  

At the same time, as you saw, the entire incoming cohort of Music students was supposedly receiving Bob Cole Scholar funds.

Things were not adding up.

When Other-Than-Music Department Chairs and Budget Chairs started asking questions, they were told that, thanks to all the financial re-arranging and holdbacks due to the recession, the total spendable IRA and other funds were less than expected.

That answer was less than responsive to the implied question about how Bob Cole money was being factored in, but all the departments felt like they'd gotten more than the recession had led them to expect for this academic year had there not been a Cole donation; and the new fear of loss (and lies) was thereby postponed. To further chill inquiry, The King and his peeps aggressively filled the campus airwaves with prattle about "uncertainty" and "multiple financial planning scenarios" which were "on the boards"; and Para affirmed "whatever King says about finances". And then both of them threatened that things were "likely to get worse".

Consumed by orders from The King and Para to plan for the imminent cutting of courses and hires and enrollments, the Department Chairs lost track of the Cole business for a few months; and then, as King and Para had promised, things got really worse in Spring 2009.

Mid-year cuts in budget and enrollment were announced. Para stopped by the Film Department and announced there would be draconian slashes in their resources. And, the department Chairs heard that the College of The Arts was a couple hundred thousand dollars in the red (something that cannot happen logically or lawfully in a public institution that can only spend money it has on hand). 

Then, wonder of wonders, as a thank you (for letting The King take credit for the Bob Cole donation, and for serving as The King's Hatchet-Man in committing some rather distasteful retaliations), Para was upped to Provost by The King as of July 2009. 

Just in time to ensure that the 2009-10 academic year would be hit by a 10% furlough/paycut and multiple cancelled class days each semester.

Just in time for some departments -- notably, Film -- to be handpicked by The King and Para for complete deletion of their California State Lottery awards.

Yes, children, the gates to hell had been thrown open wide by The King and His Court.

So, when IRA awards were announced in Spring 2010 for Academic Year 2010-11, and the cuts were extreme (for example, Film's allocation went down by 33% from the year before, which was already cut from the year before that), no one outside of Music saw that the Bob Cole Conservatory was only cut by an unnoticeable 5%, still receiving $186,000 (highest in the College, and as much as the departments of Art, Dance, Design, and Film combined!).

But the Other-Than-Music Departments screamed bloody murder at the cuts that had been imposed on them, and College of The Arts Interim Dean Jay Kvapil responded with the following e-mail:

From: Jay Kvapil [mailto:kvapil@csulb.edu]

Sent: Tuesday, April 20, 2010 10:23 AM

To: Joanne Gordon; Micheal Pounds; David Hadlock; Dorothy Ottolia; Cyrus Parker-Jeannete; John Carnahan; Carolyn Bremer; Chris Miles; Chris Scoates; Patti Meylor; Katy Kroll

Subject: Chairs Meeting for Thursday

Chairs and Directors,

We have a single topic meeting scheduled for this Thursday at 9:00 AM.  A topic that we may wish to explore is the state of IRA funding, since some of you were shocked at your allocations.  Please let me know if you wish to discuss this topic.  If enough of you don't want to discuss it, we'll cancel the meeting.  Please let me know one way or another.

Thanks,

Jay

************************************

Answering Kvapil's e-mail, all the Other-Than-Music Departments confirmed that the ONLY thing they wanted to discuss at the meeting was the cut in IRA funds.

But John Carnahan -- Chair of the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music -- had other ideas. He and The King and Para did not want the Other-Than-Music Departments to know how much IRA funding Music had been given, and they didn't want anyone to know that The King and Para were responsible for the inequity. (Also, as it would later turn out, they didn't want anyone to know that Music's IRA award contained vast money for scholarships which should have been paid by the Bob Cole funds.)

So, Carnahan used a long-standing ploy of cowardly academics everywhere: he blamed everything on students. Because students made up the IRA Board and, by rights (since IRA money is student fee money), determined the award amounts to be sent on to the President for affirmation (or revision), Carnahan blamed the students for the cuts. 

Here's the e-mail he sent to the Chairs and Directors of the Other-Than-Music Departments in an attempt to stave off further discussion of the IRA awards:

From: John Carnahan 

Sent: Tuesday, April 20, 2010 10:30 AM

To: Jay Kvapil

Cc: Joanne Gordon; Micheal Pounds; David Hadlock; Dorothy Ottolia; Cyrus Parker-Jeannete; Carolyn Bremer; Chris Miles; Chris Scoates; Patti Meylor; Katy Kroll

Subject: Re: Chairs Meeting for Thursday

Not much we can do about IRA except to be sure that one of our 

students runs for President of the student body and wins...... 

Frankly, if COTA ran a candidate and all of our students (COTA) voted for that candidate they would win easily.  Something to consider.....

It's too bad that something so important is politically controlled by 

students....

**********************************

Now let us be clear. Carnahan was an old hand who'd long served at CSULB and under Don Para. He knew exactly what he was doing when he wrote that craven e-mail.

Seeing the Carnahan e-mail, one of the Other-Than-Music Chairs fell back in disgust. He must have suddenly felt he was that fabled little turtle named Mack down there at the bottom of the stack, a turtle who was concerned about the conduct of the great King Yertle and thought he'd better share his concerns with the other pond dwellers (yes, THUG does Dr. Seuss anytime anywhere).

Mack was in fact David Hadlock, Chair of the Art Department; but, more importantly, he was an honored and renowned faculty advisor to the IRA Board of students, and he'd carefully jotted down the amounts of the awards made by the Board before the list went to The King for his pro forma approval.

Good thing, because the President threw out the Board's awards and revised them to suit his discretion.

What you are about to see is The King's awards, with handwritten numbers of what the IRA Board really awarded before The King changed the numbers.

What you are about to see is something King Alexander never wanted you to see.

But we'd like to think that Hadlock knew he was present at an evolutionary moment in CSULB's history, and he'd better preserve the record and then share the record if he meant to save his school.

So, on April 22, 2010, College of The Arts Dean Jay Kvapil and Associate Dean Chris Miles convened the afore-referenced meeting of all the Department Chairs in the College of The Arts. Well, all but one. Music's John Carnahan was an alarming no-show as Hadlock handed around the final Presidential list of IRA awards, and one of those Chairs -- another person of truth determined to save his school, a certain Dr. Micheal Pounds from the Film Department -- wrote down the numbers that Hadlock read off from his private list of the awards.

What you need to do now is read the document below and: (i) review the handwritten "real" award made by the IRA Board (even though it is in the "Summer Funding Requested" Column, the handwritten number is in fact the "Fall and Spring IRA Allocation for 2010-2011" made by the IRA Board and then sent on to The King for affirmation); (ii) then compare the handwritten number to the final number given by the President in the column just left of the handwritten numbers.

It doesn't take an accountant or a lawyer or a college professor to immediately appreciate the import of The King's revisions to the IRA awards.

He took money from everywhere and pumped it into Athletics AND -- according to his own repeated testimony -- the supposedly well-endowed and supposedly cash rich Bob Cole Conservatory of Music. 

At the same time The King made a particular effort to cut down awards to his enemies like the Film Department. In reading the list of cuts, you quickly see who The King felt was on his side and who he felt were critics in need of a thrashing until they would fall in line.

After Hadlock showed this document to the Chairs and read them the "real" awards that The King had altered, the Chairs' body language ranged from livid to homicidal.

Why in the world did the Cole Conservatory need all this money when the Cole Conservatory supposedly had all this Cole money already??? Why was donation-rich Music being so favored for University resources over and above truly needy Departments and programs?

The answer was an indecipherable letter from King Alexander and Don Para, handed to Hadlock for him to use to smooth over any ruffled feathers of his IRA Board student mentees should they hear how their awards had been so thoroughly re-done by The President. 

But now Hadlock felt he'd better draw that letter out of his folio and read it to the locked and loaded Chairs of the Other-Than-Music Departments. 

Hadlock explained that he could not pass around or give out copies of the letter, he only felt comfortable -- or tolerably uncomfortable -- reading it aloud so the Chairs would understand The King's official position on this matter.

From its first clause, the language of the letter intentionally shifted the focus of inquiry away from the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music, while making it clearer than clear that anyone who wanted to pick a fight as to these IRA awards would be picking a fight with The King and his Hatchet-Man, and that was a fight that could only end badly for the instigator.

The King's letter stated his revised award numbers were unassailably in the best interests of the University, and, simply and strangely, that "the cuts were due to scholarship retention".

To this day no one knows what this phrase means, other than that its purpose was to show that the writer knew budget numbers and finance-speak better than anyone else on campus, and that this letter was to end any further discussion of the matter at hand.

As the embarrassed messenger of this madness, Hadlock had -- unknown to Alexander and Para -- felt the need to lessen the guilt of his guilty knowledge by sharing with his colleagues both this disinformation letter and the amounts of the real IRA awards, the ones made by the IRA Board, so that Alexander's subsequent revisions and re-routing of funds to Music would be exposed in this room. 

And there, in that room, in that Chairs meeting, in academia, in a College office with the Dean and Associate Dean shhshing and shooing the group from further discussion, that's where the matter was left and dropped for fear. 

In academia, discontented people are quite content to murmur and grumble and talk behind other people's backs, but never do they force a confrontation to conclusion, particularly when the University President tells them to butt out or else.

Academics are wimps, make no mistake about it. You don't need Panzers to run them down, a steely gaze will part them as surely as the proverbial hot knife through butter. In the end, academics do not know how to govern and do not have the will for it, even though, as pointed out earlier, they actually know what's best. THUG has no answer for this, but perhaps some of our readers do. We certainly do applaud the occasional faculty that actually stands up for something. (LSU? We'll see.) However, such a stand has never ever occurred at CSULB.

So the Cole matter simply became something no one in that room dared to ask after. Para was Provost and not about to undermine his own claim to fame, and The King was using the Cole Donation as his highway to heaven.

But someone who wasn't in that room took up the cause. Pounds came out of that meeting and handed over all the information to his colleague Professor Lane, and Lane went crazy, and when Lane goes crazy it involves research and investigation and confrontation with the facts.

The phrase "scholarship retention" clanged and pounded in Lane's head. He started hunting through scores of e-mails and records, and he came across a document that had been sent to him quite accidentally, quite innocently, by a budget person who worked for Para when Para was Dean of the College of The Arts in the Fall of 2008.

Now, you will recall that the Bob Cole scholarship funding began as of Fall 2008, and had continued continuously ever since.

Yet, in the document Lane found, The Bob Cole Conservatory of Music had asked for and been awarded vast IRA funding specifically for scholarships for 2008-09 and 2009-10. And now, based on The King's increased award for 2010-11, that IRA funding for Bob Cole scholarships continued. AND the Music Chair -- Carnahan -- had the discretion to use even more of his total IRA awards for scholarships if he chose, bearing in mind that Music received close to $200,000 in IRA funds each year.  

Here are two pages from the document Lane found -- this is the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music's IRA request for 2009-10, which includes a re-cap of IRA award and spending in 2008-09:

Armed with all this information, Lane confronted Alexander in writing and Para in a meeting, and Pounds joined the fray on the side of good, demanding to know the truth as to why the Film Department's funding had been slashed while Music's went up. 

Here:

From: Brian Alan Lane <brianalanlane@earthlink.net>
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:27:46 -0700
To: F Alexander <fkalexander@csulb.edu>
Cc: Don Para <para@csulb.edu>, Micheal Pounds <michealpounds@roadrunner.com>
Conversation: ADDED OUTRAGE
Subject: ADDED OUTRAGE

I also note that the below comes on the heels of FEA being the ONLY department in COTA NOT to receive a single cent of lottery money this year.

Dear President Alexander,

As the Chair of FEA’s Budget Committee, I have been sent word of the relevant IRA award documents for 2010-2011, including the poorly written and barely comprehensible cover letter from you -- in which you seem to be trying to explain how and why award amounts were cut and shifted around by your office after the IRA Board made their recommendations.

Regardless of your seeming explanations, the real truth is plenty apparent by a simple review of the hard numbers, and I know you are a numbers guy, so let’s have at it:

1. FEA received the largest percentage reduction of ANY IRA AWARD made to any department on campus.

2. FEA also received the largest percentage reduction DIRECTLY FROM YOU (rather than from the IRA Board).  In fact, the IRA Board gave FEA an expected 10% cut from last year, to the dollar. You then proceeded to MORE THAN TRIPLE that reduction.

3. Your seeming claim (in your letter) that your cuts were due to scholarship retention is nonsense. You cut FEA by 33%, and then handed every dollar to Music, so that their reduction was only 5% (the lowest reduction of any department on campus). Yet, Music has vast scholarships through the Bob Cole donation. In fact (and incredibly), Music asks for scholarships directly from IRA ($84,000 was last year’s request), which should not even count as an Instructionally Related Activity Program. I note that the IRA Board recommended cutting Music’s previous award by 20% -- perhaps that is precisely because Music lumps scholarships in there? In all events, no need for Music to worry — you gave back the Board’s cut and then filled Music’s coffers even more. This leaves FEA’s production students in deep and impossible trouble in making their senior thesis films and projects, without scholarships or other funds to cover the loss. (In hard numbers, Music’s award total is more than 3 times FEA’s, so the % reduction to FEA cuts deeper.)

4. More than one of us in COTA finds it other than coincidental that the Interim Provost’s former home has received all your IRA largesse, and that Music’s 5% cut from last year is a vastly smaller cut than any other COTA Department received. The next lowest cut was 11%, for the University Art Museum. Hmmm...  any coincidence that the current Interim Dean hailed from Art and that the UAM falls directly under him at COTA?

5. The motive of your animus toward FEA was clearly stated by then Dean Para when he spoke at the FEA Faculty Meeting in March 2009 (which was taped, by the way — I will be providing a copy to both Rene Castro and the Chancellor’s Office next week). In that meeting, Para advised FEA that we would be punished financially for the publicity surrounding the whistleblowing as to our imposters the previous year. Since Pounds and I were the primary whistleblowers, these threats and acts against FEA and us are retaliatory in nature.

I am attaching the Final IRA Allocation document and the 5 Year COTA IRA History document. The handwritten numbers on the Final Allocation document ARE the amounts recommended by the IRA Board, so that you can remind yourself of the changes you made and the very specific attack committed on FEA.

I won’t ask what you were thinking, because it’s obvious. But perhaps now you will take the time to think again and do right by our students, regardless of your personal feelings toward me and Pounds.

Sincerely --

Brian Alan Lane

*****************************************

The response was a thunderous silence.

Not a word of written response from The King.

Not a word out of Para's mouth in person.

And then the retaliations came. 

Endless retaliations.

The subject of another Installment of THUG, yet to come.

But, the result was that Lane and Pounds were forcibly taken out of the fight and could not get to the truth of Alexander's re-routing of funds until...

In 2013, prior to The King's departure for LSU, THUG saw the latest Cole spokesmodel make his witness to the CSU Board of Trustees in order to re-affirm the flow of Cole money into students' pockets. 

Then THUG saw that the King was falsely telling LSU that the Cole donation was 16.4 million of endowment AND another 16.4 million of capital fundraising, giving The King credit for 32.8 million dollars of fundraising by The King's Special Math.

And that's when the chickens finally came home to roost. The money re-routing wasn't just about retaliation for whistleblowing, it was about stopping the whistleblowers before they stumbled onto the bigger crime. If King Alexander was willing to lie to LSU about the total amount of the Cole donation, could it be possible he'd been lying about every aspect of Cole all along? Could it be possible that Alexander and Para had been co-opting money and moving it into Music to cover the Bob Cole Scholars because there really was no Cole money at all and never had been? Even the re-routed IRA money was not enough to cover all that, which meant there had to be other monies co-opted too, or red ink spilled in a public ledger. Was that even possible? All this seemed too big a lie to have kept hidden in plain sight for 5 years, but...

THUG determined this all needed to be investigated, and so we made a Public Records Act request for all documents which evidenced every aspect of the Cole donation, particularly funds received and funds disbursed. Here's what we asked for:

From: donna cohen 
Sent: Friday, May 17, 2013 1:16 PM
To: Gene Wohlgezogen
Cc: Beth Ryan
Subject: another document request

Hi Gene,

I hope all is well.

I need some more copies of documents.

The pledge documents and all final documents which memorialize (1) the donation from the Bob Cole Estate, (2) the naming of the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music, (2) the terms of pledge, (3) the terms of the naming and the basis of required approvals from the Trustees and others, (4) the flow of funds and designated use of the funds, (5) the breakdown of funds received and disbursed since the pledge began.

Likely, these are all in one small file at the Foundation?  

Thanks so much 

Donna

Ps Do I need to copy anyone else on this request? Just in case copied Beth Ryan on this request

Donna Cohen 


*********************************************************************

For many weeks, Gene Wohlgezogen -- the Assistant Information Security Officer at CSULB, the guy in charge of responding to Public Records Act requests, a very nice guy in a thankless job -- told us it would take the school time "to gather up the requested documents", that "the documents are in various places on campus", and "the documents have to be reviewed for redaction or exemption from discovery".

By no coincidence and not unexpectedly, this stall lasted exactly until the week The King left for LSU.

And then, as Alexander landed in Baton Rouge, here's the response we got:

From: Gene Wohlgezogen
Date: Monday, July 8, 2013 4:02 PM
To: donna cohen
Subject: CSULB PRA #12-096: Bob Cole Records

RE:  Public Records Act Request 12-096

Dear Donna Cohen:

We have used best efforts and have conducted a reasonable search for the records you requested on May 17, 2013.

The University has not yet received distributions from the Cole family trust as such distributions will not occur until after the death of the survivor of those named in the trust.  Separate donations totaling $2,515,000 were received from a donor for construction of the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music Pavilion and Plaza. 

Records containing the personal financial information, estate planning information, and gift planning information of a donor are exempted from disclosure under Cal. Ed. Code § § 89914.5(c); 89916(a)(2) and Cal. Govt. Code § 6255, and will not be disclosed. 

We have retrieved 23 pages of non-exempt records responsive to your request.  If you would like to inspect these records, please contact me to schedule a mutually convenient date and time.  If you would like copies of these records, we will begin to make copies upon receipt of payment from you at 20 cents per page, for a total of $4.60.

Please continue to direct all questions and future records requests directly to our office by email at iso@csulb.edu, FAX at (562) 985-2411, or to the below listed address.

Sincerely,

Gene Wohlgezogen
Asst. Information Security Officer
CSULB Information Security Management, Audit & Compliance
1250 Bellflower Blvd, BH-372
Long Beach, CA 90840-0127
Phone: 562-985-4862
Fax: 562-985-2411

***********************************************************************

"The University has not yet received distributions from the Cole family trust as such distributions will not occur until after the death of the survivor of those named in the trust."

That was the action line. Here, as of July 8, 2013:

"The University has not yet received distributions from the Cole family trust as such distributions will not occur until after the death of the survivor of those named in the trust."

What this meant was that five and a half years after The King had announced the donation as 15.2 million in endowment and 1.2 million in current cash, with five years' worth of Bob Cole Scholars giving thanks to Bob Cole for the money they received from him and his estate, in fact there had never been a single cent given to CSULB, let alone disbursed to students; AND as this was entirely a trust being used by Cole's family survivors, there was no date certain by which any donation might arrive because none was due until the last survivor of the trust would pass away, and there was no amount certain for that remainder donation. Indeed, it was quite possible that the corpus of the estate would be spent out or dramatically reduced by the Cole family beneficiaries, or even by recession or bad investment. In all events, it was nothing short of heinous that King Alexander had told everyone since January of 2008 that the Cole donation would be used immediately and had been used consistently to subsidize Music students who would otherwise not be able to afford school.

But THUG wanted to make sure we weren't misunderstanding Gene's official response to our Public Records Act request, so we called Gene and had a chat, and he confirmed our interpretation.

According to Gene, he had been specifically told to tell us that there was no actual Bob Cole money, and there never had been. All there was was an assigned right to whatever would be left in the Cole family trust once all of the family beneficiaries in the trust had died. AND, Gene was not allowed to tell us the names of those beneficiaries, he could only confirm there was no date certain when CSULB would get anything from the Cole "endowment" or what amount it would be by that point.

And Gene confirmed there was not and never had been any "current cash donation" of 1.2 million dollars or any other amount. The only Cole donation was the prospective right to the uncertain remainder of the trust.

THUG has therefore made additional requests for documents, including but not limited to those which evidence what funds have really been used to pay the Bob Cole Scholars for the last five years, and counting.

We've also turned our findings over to the Feds.

Yes, dear readers, THUG believes that The King has lied.

And he has lied with purpose.

He has lied to defraud.

He has lied to con.

He has lied to get professors and administrators and chancellors and trustees all to vote to approve the re-naming of the CSULB Music Department so he can lie some more to other donors for matching funds to match a donation that doesn't actually exist, and he has lied to make himself into a tiger of a fundraiser deserving of a better job and a greater salary and other perks.

Alexander and Para have lied by subsidizing music students with re-directed, co-opted, and misused funds from other sources while pretending they've come from Bob Cole.

And, when lying hasn't been sufficient to get the job done, Alexander and Para have resorted to every form of intimidation and retaliation they could think of, to accomplish their evil and then cover their tracks. 

It's wild.

When it comes to the Alexanders, in the end they seem to lie and bully just because they can. They seem to get off snookering people in ever new and brazen ways. They seem to approach each and every day as another opportunity to prove they are untouchable, unaccountable, better than everyone else not because they really are better but just because bullying can seem like accomplishment, while making money and satisfying greed is self-justified and free of any annoying moral constraint.

And thus we end THUG Installment 9 with a simple question to King Alexander: what new lie are you going to tell us and CSULB and LSU in response to what THUG has just presented?

And how do we know when The King is lying?

Answer: his beak is moving.

As to Don Para, we will meet him again in an Installment we like to call "Para Under Oath -- in 3D Multi-Media".

As to the Alexanders, there are a couple of chapters coming, notably one we have titled "The Curious Case of Dan Lavit", and another "Oxford Ground Round".

But there is so much more story to go involving so many characters! 

Please, stay tuned, stay involved, read, give us your opinions and comments, and take action.

To our friends at LSU, we have to say that if this THUG 9 doesn't give you enough ammunition to ask some tough questions of your leaders, then you will deserve what you will have to endure these next years. Or at least until government authorities take action.

To our friends at CSULB, we appreciate your behind-the-scenes help, but now we all have a Presidential search to conduct, and you all need to stand up and be counted. We have a very timely chance to turn back the clock and breathe life back into our campus. More on that in our next Installment of THUG, coming within the week!

Click here to sign up and be alerted when the next installment is published or if you just want to connect and share. 

THUG The Book Is designed so you can read the Installments in any order you want.

Installment Eleven - If A Para Falls In The Forest, Does Anyone Care?
Installment Ten - Cookin' The Books Alexander Style
Installment Nine - The Riddle of The Stinks

Installment Eight - the King Who Must Not Be Named

Installment Seven B - The Biggest Academic Ponzi Scheme Ever

Installment Seven A - Indictment of The Alexander Family For Criminal Conspiracy

Installment Six - The Odor of Mendacity

Installment Five - The King's New Clothes

Installment Four - High Crimes and Pissy Demeanors

Installment Three - The Long Beach Studios Hoax

Installment Two - Spielberg Narrative

Installment Two - Spielberg Documents

Installment One 

Press Release September 10, 2013

Meet The Next CSULB President - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Sept 11, 2013 

CSULB faculty, students, alums, and LB business community leaders are determined to make CSULB’s Presidential search a public forum of candidates and ideas, and not a deep dark secret. 

Town Hall Meeting to hear the issues and discussion with CSULB Presidential Candidates. 

Wednesday Sept 11, 2-3:30 pm in the Student Union — USU-304

THUG The Book and all the foregoing material is 

copyrighted for all purposes in all media 

-- all rights reserved by Brian Alan Lane -- 2022

All original documents have been maintained and are available by justified written request to:  Michael J. Olecki, Esq. -- Grodsky and Olecki -- 2001 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 210, Santa Monica CA 90403 

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