A BLAST FROM THE PAST…Spinmeister Still Full Of Hot Air

MARCH 11, 2015 “Short-term standpoint, and I’ve used this quote a few times, it’s education as usual. Nothing changes. When you look at the verdict and the charges and everything like that, you’re talking about the situation that is a personal issue. You’re dealing with a tax return: 2009, a tax return; 2010, before the school opened. And it doesn’t have any impact on the school right now.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82mbXMQxo10

FEBRUARY 17, 2023: “When I took over we had inherited a massive amount of debt… and we’ve been cleaning it up ever since,” he says. “As of this month we officially graduated from the Treasury Department’s list, and we’re now officially out of deficit.” https://www.9and10news.com/2023/02/17/north-central-academy-pays-off-debt-and-sees-budget-surplus/

“SSM transferred the entire annual management fee and a significant portion of the annual lease payment in July 2014, the first month of the fiscal year. These transfers were made prior to SSM earning the right to these payments. In addition, the contract with SSM did not include an objective measure to calculate the annual management fee.”

Bay City Academy

June 2015 Financial Statements

WHAT…WE WERE SUPPOSED TO NOTIFY YOU?

Oh, how I love the “debt” versus “deficit” dodge, usually employed by slick spinmeisters to fool the rubes. In a story that aired recently on Traverse City’s 9&10 News, a grizzled Brian Lynch (resembling a spare-change panhandler compared to his 2015 GQ iteration) floats the notion that, under his watch, Mancelona’s North Central Academy (and the Bay City Academy) managed to dig out from under $5.0 million in debt.

In addition, Lynch crows about eliminating the deficit that has hung over the school since founder Steven Ingersoll was convicted of tax fraud in 2015.

However, Lynch failed to acknowledge his role in concealing the charter school’s financial status from the Michigan Department of Education until he was ordered in December 2015 to a come-to-Jesus meeting in Lansing.

On December 3, 2015, the Detroit Free Press reported that Brian Whiston, then the Michigan Department of Education’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, had called in representatives of the Bay City Academy (including Lynch) to explain the charter school’s massive deficit — and why it was not reported to the MDE.

The Michigan Department of Education’s December 2015 Quarterly District Deficit Report confirmed that while the Bay City Academy reported a General Fund Balance of $19,743 for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2013 and a balance of $31,187 for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2014, the charter school’s fiscal year 2015 (ending June 30, 2015) resulted in a -$1,359,477 deficit.

And while the Bay City Academy’s 2015 audit indicated a “plan of action” would later be filed with the State of Michigan, it appears “Proactiv” is just pimple medication — and not a verb on a Bay City Academy vocabulary quiz.

Officially confirming the Academy’s deficit status to me in a November 17, 2015 email (shown above), Jeff Kolb, of the Michigan Department of Education’s State Aid and School Finance office, revealed the MDE “first learned of Bay City Academy’s deficit when they uploaded their Financial Information Data to us” in late October 2015.

In the 9&10 News report, Lynch claims that management “worked some difficult business decisions and restructured contracts, grant writing. And we had to get really creative when you don’t have a lot of money.”

Oh, like spending $1.1 million on a building previously owned by Steven Ingersoll?

Now who would do a crazy thing like that?