Charter School Operated As Nightclub On Weekends

This story is unbelievable, but given the crookedness of many charter school operators, maybe it shouldn't be:

PHILADELPHIA - March 31, 2010 (WPVI) -- School officials in Philadelphia say a charter school will no longer allow a nightclub to operate on its premises during nights and weekends.

District officials met with operators of the Harambee Institute of Science and Technology Charter School on Wednesday.

The school had come under fire for allowing Club Damani to operate in its cafeteria during off-hours. The club had been serving alcohol despite an expired liquor license.

A statement from the district says Harambee officials have removed all banquet supplies and equipment from the building.

...

On Tuesday, City Controller Alan Butkovitz says his office has found questionable spending at the Harambee Institute of Science and Technology Charter School.

Butkovitz announced his findings Tuesday following an Action News report that Harambee operates in the same building as Club Damani.

At a news conference on Tuesday, Butkovitz raised the name of one Rhonda Sharif. Butkovitz says she was the chief operating officer at Harambee and the CFO and /or business manager at two other charter schools all at the same time. The other two schools are the The Mathematics, Civics and Sciences Center on North Broad Street and Khepera in Germantown.

Butkovitz said Sharif pulled in hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal income from 2003 until 2008 and he listed hundreds of thousands of dollars in spending by Sharif for conferences, retreats and travel for which no documentation is provided.

However, he stopped short of claiming there's any illegal activity here.

During this same period, according to the controller, Rhonda Sharif's husband, Shamsud-Din Sharif, hit the jackpot with millions in construction contracts at those same three charter schools. His company, Str8 Hand Construction, did an estimated $7.5 million in business at the schools over four years.

You have to watch the footage the ABC affiliate shot of the nightclub/charter school in action.

The nightclub at the charter school has been up and running since 2002.

That's 8 years ago.

Neighbors have complained, the Philly school district knew about the nightclub as far back as 2002, but nothing was done about either closing the nightclub down or investigating the finances of the school or the pay of the charter school operator, which clearly are fishy.

Not to mention looking into the $7.5 million dollar construction contracts the operator's husband "won" to do work at the schools his wife operates.

Explain to me again why it is charter school operators say outside auditing and oversight of their schools is a problem?

Could it be they're afraid hundreds if not thousands of these kinds of criminal activities will be exposed when outside oversight is done on the charter school/for-profit school industry.