Funds May Have Been Directed to Friends

D.C. Charter Schools Chief Investigated

Federal officials are investigating whether the D.C. Board of Education's executive director of charter schools funneled federal funds to personal acquaintances working with the schools that she helped monitor, according to sources with knowledge of the investigation.

They also are reviewing records to see whether Brenda L. Belton reaped any financial benefit from more than $350,000 paid to a private company to provide technical assistance to charter schools, sources said. The company was located in a building that Belton once owned and that is currently owned by her daughter, said sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the investigation.

Belton, who was officially named head of the charter schools office in January 2003, was placed on paid administrative leave in June after federal authorities raided her home, office and the company. Belton's attorney, Danny Onorato, declined to comment.

Channing D. Phillips, spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office, which is leading the investigation from its fraud and public corruption section, declined to comment.

City investigators were trying to conduct a separate probe, said D.C. government officials who spoke on condition that they not be identified. But their efforts were hampered because federal authorities had taken many of the documents that the D.C. inspector general and Office of the D.C. Auditor wanted to review.

The federal investigation is expected to take several months and includes at least 30 boxes of records to sift through as well as subpoenaed bank records, sources said.

Belton is at the center of an investigation into the possible misuse of hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal and city funds intended to help students in struggling charter schools. Equal Access in Education, a company hired to monitor the city's charter schools, also is under investigation, according to documents.

In fiscal 2002-03, the city paid $53,950 to Equal Access in Education. The next year it paid $65,000, followed by $189,000 in 2004-05 and $48,000 in 2005-06, according to calculations by D.C. government obtained in a Freedom of Information request.

Investigators are reviewing how contracts from Belton's office were awarded and whether rules were followed, sources said.

Documents show that Equal Access was awarded a contract in April 2003 to monitor and complete performance evaluations of most of the 17 charter schools Belton's office oversaw over five years. Equal Access secured the contract after a "Technical Evaluation Panel" of four people -- with Belton as the non-voting head -- reviewed proposals from contractors.

One of the panel members is listed as Linda Buther, who was described as the director of reading in the D.C. public schools. But personnel records do not show a Linda Buther working for the school system at that time, according to a source with access to records. The closest matching name in the records is a woman named Linda Butler, who was director of reading at D.C. Head Start. But Butler said she does not recall taking part in any evaluation panel.

Federal investigators also are trying to learn whether Belton helped direct federal grant money to friends at the charter schools, sources said. They are focusing part of the probe on a program operated jointly by the charter school office formerly run by Belton and the D.C. Public Charter School Board, which oversees 34 of the city's 51 charter schools. The program involves money used to help low-performing charter schools meet the requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

A Sept. 22, 2005, invoice from Equal Access requests payment of $76,250. The invoice says that "each school will receive technical assistance" in areas of noncompliance with No Child Left Behind in the fields of reading and math.

It is unclear whether the services contracted had been completed at the publicly funded, independently run charter schools listed on the invoice: Barbara Jordan, Booker T. Washington, Children's Studio, Community Academy, Elsie Whitlow Stokes Community Freedom, Hyde Leadership, IDEA, Ideal Academy, JOS-ARZ Academy, Kamit Institute for Magnificent Achievers, LAMB, Mary McLeod Bethune Day Academy, Next Step-El Praximo Paso, Options, Roots and Young America Works.

The co-chairman of the Board of Education, Carolyn N. Graham, said Belton's work seemed fine until the disclosures of the federal investigation. However, city government sources said some Board of Education members had been dissatisfied with Belton's work before the federal raids on her office and home.

Staff writer V. Dion Haynes contributed to this report.