A Right-to-Know Law request to the School District
In May 2022, the Philadelphia School Board approved a $450k contract with Joseph and Associates, LLC, to provide “transition services” for incoming superintendent Tony Watlington. The action item the Board voted on stated the purpose is “To provide Dr. Tony B. Watlington, Sr. support to ensure a smooth leadership transition as he begins his tenure as Superintendent of The School District of Philadelphia.” According to this Inquirer article, the contractor sounds kind of shady.
I honestly want to know: what is this contractor going to do that costs $450k? “Transition services” is real vague.
I submitted two RTKL requests. First, I asked for “A copy of all emails between the School District and Joseph & Associates sent or received between January 1, 2022 and present, relating to transition services for Dr. Watlington.” Then a couple weeks later I asked for a copy of the contract itself because I realized I hadn’t seen the actual terms anywhere.
The District produced a few emails about the scope of work and the attachments, which were proposals from Joseph & Associates. I know that documents alone don’t reflect the whole picture, especially not in-person or telephone negotiations. But I’m getting the impression the District didn’t exactly drive a hard bargain. On 5/20/22, Dr. Joseph submitted a proposal for $268,000 (the budget in that proposal is $268k and the proposal says “not to exceed $275,000”). Then the next day, he submitted one for $292,000. Then:
Four days later, the School Board approved the final contract, which tacked on another $150k for transition team development.
The budget outlined in the contract:
I don’t know what to make of it, but the contract, approved by the Board on 5/26/22, says that contract began on 4/8/22. So I wonder how much say the Board of Education actually got in this. It comes across as if the District let Joseph & Associates name their own price for work that had already begun, and the Board just had to go with it.
Here’s the full contract and the emails back and forth about the scope of services. And an email from Shawn Joseph explaining why he had to leave Nashville.