I COULD HEDGE HERE, BUT I’M JUST GOING TO SAY IT — The Bay City Academy Is Not “Debt-Free”
“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.”
Brian Lynch, February 17, 2023; 9&10 News
Within the last two weeks, local Traverse City media reported the Bay City Academy/North Central Academy had erased a “$5 million deficit”, and the charter school combo was currently “debt-free”. (Mancelona’s North Central Academy and the Bay City Academy are run as the same district, and share a unified budget.)
Although Lynch himself used “debt” and “deficit” interchangeably, neither claim is true.
Within the last two fiscal years, the Bay City Academy has incurred nearly $1.3 million in seller-financed, land contract debt related to its real estate acquisitions — the June 2021 purchase of the North Central Academy’s Mancelona building and the April 2022 acquisition of 301 N. Farragut Street in Bay City (the “Farragut Schoolhouse”).
As you can see in the excerpt above, taken directly from the Bay City Academy’s FYE 2022 financial statement as filed with the State of Michigan, as of “June 30, 2022, the Academy had outstanding long-term debt”.
In April 2015, the Bay City Academy entered into a two-year contract with Lynch’s Mitten Educational Management, LLC. At June 30, 2015, the Academy’s audit revealed the school “did not have outstanding long-term debt.” However, the Bay City Academy had incurred a significant operating deficit in that year, resulting in a cash flow shortage. As of June 30, 2015, the Academy’s current liabilities exceeded its current assets by $1,374,477.
In the report that aired on 9&10 News, Brian Lynch stated “we had to get really creative” because the district didn’t “have a lot of money.”
So why was Lynch reluctant to discuss the transactions that were briefly mentioned in the Bay City Academy’s publicly-available fiscal year end audits?
I can’t answer that question, but I will tell you what I learned from a November 11, 2022 “cease and desist” letter sent to me on behalf of the Bay City Academy by Bodman PLC — a business law firm headquartered in Detroit’s Ford Field.
BETTER CALL SAUL, STEVE!
On July 15, 2022, I published a story here on Medium titled “BETTER CALL SAUL, STEVE”, revealing pertinent details of an April 2022 land contract sale of the Farragut Schoolhouse to the Bay City Academy.
Although I had obtained multiple documents from the Bay County Register of Deeds, the Michigan Treasury Department and a Freedom of Information Act request to the Bay City Academy, I lacked a crucial element.
However, in its November 11, 2022 “cease and desist” letter, Bodman unwittingly handed me that missing link: the entity that paid off Steven Ingersoll’s Farragut Schoolhouse Wildfire Credit Union mortgage.
Here is an excerpt from the “cease and desist” letter:
The mortgage on the Farragut facility was not paid off with “taxpayer funds”. Michigan ALN Properties, LLC, using its own private sources of funds (not “taxpayer funds,” as you allege, apparently meaning Academy funds), paid off the then-outstanding $522,281.63 mortgage Wildfire Credit Union held on the property at the time the Academy entered into the purchase agreement and land contract to acquire 301 N. Farragut to the Academy.
November 11, 2022 “Cease and Desist” Letter; Bodman PLC
Turns out, “Michigan ALN Properties, LLC”, the Michigan business entity that paid off the mortgage, was formed on July 1, 2021 and officially recognized by the State of Michigan the next day.
The entity was formed by Sandra J. Oliver, a Minnesota resident and the wife of convicted felon (and disbarred attorney) Timothy J. Oliver.
Federal Bureau of Prisons official records reveal that Timothy Oliver (who plead guilty on September 10, 2014 “for stealing $500,000 from ARS Tectonica, a Mexican construction company, in connection with an alleged real estate project in Libya”) and Steven Ingersoll both served time at Duluth FPC — with their sentences overlapping for a period of nearly 18 months.
But where did Sandra Oliver get that fat stack of cash?
I’m asking this question for a reason: in a July 28, 2020 memorandum filed in Minnesota’s Sixth Judicial District Court revealed Sandra Oliver claimed her 2019 household income was “$28,120” when seeking MinnesotaCare medical assistance benefits.
In September 2020, Oliver agreed to “enter into an agreement for monthly repayments of the overpayment”.
So, after ‘correcting the record’, here’s the story of how the wife of a former federal inmate (and disbarred attorney) Timothy J. Oliver “paid of the then-outstanding $522,281.63 mortgage Wildfire Credit held on the property at the time the Academy entered into the purchase agreement and land contract to acquire 301 N. Farragut to the Academy” — as confirmed in the “cease and desist” letter.
Although the “cease and desist” letter could have stained my investigation like a cocktail spilled on a white tablecloth — it didn’t.
THE PRISONER’S WIFE: From Less Than $29,000 A Year To A $522,281.63 Mortgage Payoff
On April 20, 2022, days after Sandra Oliver’s “Michigan ALN Properties” paid off a commercial construction mortgage on the Bay City building Steven Ingersoll had owned since 2012, the charter school’s Board of Directors and management company executed the ownership transfer of the building to the Bay City Academy via a land contract.
The property sale process was facilitated by Oliver, a Minnesota resident.
On April 20, 2022, Oliver portrayed herself as the “CEO of Farragut Schoolhouse LLC”, a Michigan entity formed by Ingersoll, in the official Bay County, Michigan, “Warranty Deed” property transfer document.
(State of Michigan Corporation records appear to directly contradict Oliver’s assertion: she is not listed as a member of Farragut Schoolhouse LLC.)
And Steven Ingersoll appears to counter Oliver’s claim in this federal court transcript:
In addition, the “Warranty Deed” was notarized on April 20, 2022 in Two Harbors, MN, by Jessica Mae Altobell, who works for the Two Harbors Credit Union. In that document (shown above), Oliver, acting as the “CEO of Farragut Schoolhouse”, then transferred the Farragut St. building to a Michigan entity she did control for $1.00: “Michigan ALN Properties, LLC”, registered at 1562 Burlington Road, Suite A, Two Harbors, MN 55616.
(Michigan ALN Properties was formed by Oliver on July 2, 2021; State ID# 802698159.)
On April 20, 2022, after transferring the Farragut Schoolhouse from “Farragut Schoolhouse LLC”, Oliver (acting as the manager of Michigan ALN Properties, LLC) then “sold” the building to the Bay City Academy for $1.1 million via a Land Contract.
Under the terms of the land contract sale made by Sandra J. Oliver, the Bay City Academy’s monthly payments jumped from 2021’s $9,750 rent to a $14,000 monthly land contract mortgage payment.
Sandra J. Oliver was on both sides of the initial transaction: as “Seller” (purported CEO of Farragut Schoolhouse, LLC) and “Buyer” (manager of Michigan ALN Properties, LLC), before Michigan ALN Properties, LLC sold the building to the Bay City Academy.
On April 20, 2022, in an official Bay City Academy “Building Acquisition Due Diligence” document produced by its management company, Mitten Educational Management, Mitten’s managers (Brian Lynch and Michael Randel) misidentified the seller of the building as “ALN Properties, LLC”, a Minnesota-based Limited Liability Corporation, whose address is 6240 Homestead Road, Duluth, Minnesota 55804.
Mitten Management’s assertion is directly contradicted by the official Michigan Treasury Department Property Transfer Affidavit.
The “seller” was Sandra Oliver’s “Michigan ALN Properties, LLC”, a Michigan Limited Liability Corporation, and her signature appears on the affidavit (shown below).
In addition, Sandra J. Oliver has formed and registered Limited Liability Corporations on behalf of Steven J. Ingersoll.
Although nominally “owned” by Oliver, the corporations appear to be the launch of several “visual learning education” businesses.
Oliver registered these two corporations in her home state using the same Two Harbors, MN address used in forming “Michigan ALN Properties, LLC”: Minnesota ICONIX Learning Center, LLC and Minnesota Developmental Academy.
The websites for the ICONIX Learning Center reveals nearly identical “visual learning” therapies as those Ingersoll previously promulgated at the Bay City Academy and Grand Traverse Academy under his trademarked “Integrated Visual Learning”, or IVL.
Ingersoll now calls his method “Developmental Visual Learning”, or DVL, and even provides the voice-over for the “DVL Summary”.
I’ll ask it again: where did Sandra Oliver get that fat stack of cash?
