NEWS

Wright's former co-workers get $600,000 in contracts

Mollie Bryant

The Clarion-Ledger

Contracts between the Mississippi Department of Education and two of the state superintendent’s former co-workers appear to duplicate technology-related services while costing the state hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The contracts, worth more than $600,000, were awarded to MDE Chief Information Officer John Q. Porter before he was appointed to his position; Blue Sky Innovative Solutions LLC, for which Porter serves as CEO; Elton Stokes Jr., who is listed as a technology office director on the website for Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland; and DataOne IT Solutions, a Maryland-based company with ties to Stokes.

On top of the contracts he and his company received, Porter earned a $195,000 salary with MDE until last month, when the state auditor’s office alerted education leaders that the amount violated a state salary cap. During a state Board of Education meeting, his salary was decreased to $183,240.

Porter and Stokes would not comment.

In response to an interview request, Wright provided a written statement that said when she came to the agency in 2013, MDE’s IT department “needed urgent and major work” when it came to infrastructure, software and data management, and that a personnel evaluation was necessary to determine if they needed new training or skills.

“As a result, MDE contracted with vendors with a demonstrated track record and expertise in evaluating, organizing and modernizing complex, large-scale IT operations,” Wright said. “To date, this work has resulted in a complete reorganization and oversight of the MDE’s IT department, the development of a new software application to produce school and district performance ratings, a new system to ensure data quality, and the start of a new data warehouse to contain all the necessary information to conduct research and inform the public about the quality and progress of Mississippi’s schools.”

According to the state contract database and board meeting minutes, Porter, Stokes and related companies have had eight contracts with MDE since 2014 totaling $604,836. Three of the contracts were under $50,000 and did not require approval from the state education board.

From 2003 to 2009, Wright was an associate superintendent for Montgomery County Public Schools, where Porter served as a deputy and associate superintendent from 2000 to 2007. Stokes also worked at the school district while Wright was associate superintendent of the school district, where he was appointed to a coordinator position in 2005.

For less than a year, Porter served as superintendent of the Oklahoma City School District, where he resigned in 2008 amid 21 allegations that he misspent funds and behaved inappropriately toward staff, according to media reports.

Porter was appointed to his position last May, four months after he received a $96,454 consulting contract with MDE to conduct an organizational review of the Office of Technology and Strategic Services. During the same board meeting, Stokes received a $93,009 contract for identical services. Meeting minutes do not state if Wright or another MDE staff member had recommended the contracts.

The state Board of Education approved both contracts during executive session. Board President John Kelly did not return a call seeking comment.

Porter’s contract was his fourth with MDE after signing others as CEO of Blue Sky. In 2014, Blue Sky began consulting with MDE in a $98,500 contract to conduct an organizational review of the Office of Management Information Systems over a period of four months. Initially, the contract was for $29,050, but a month before it was set to end, about $69,000 was added to the cost. Other than day-to-day management and “high-level examination of current systems,” the duties detailed in the contract appear the same.

The month after that contract ended, Blue Sky received its second contract for $98,454 to continue the organizational review. The duties described in this contract were identical to Blue Sky’s initial contract after it was modified, including the creation of a plan for customer service within MDE and between the agency and school districts.

That contract was set to end in June 2015, but before it was complete, Blue Sky received a third contract for $48,500, also ending in June 2015. This contract was to create an IT strategy and to develop a state accountability reporting application.

Meanwhile, Stokes received a five-month, $48,000 contract in 2014 to review the department’s data needs and to build data management resources. Last July, Stokes received a six-month, $48,055 contract that was amended to cost a total of $73,633 and last until June of this year. The second contract was to assist with the development of an IT strategy, presumably the same one referred to in Blue Sky’s most recent contract with MDE, and to monitor the agency’s data warehouse system.

However, another contract overlaps Stokes’ second contract with MDE, both in services and the timeframe. A contract with Sharon Semper, doing business as DataOne IT Solutions LLC, lists identical duties and overlaps Stokes’ contract with MDE by six months.

But Stokes has a connection to DataOne, raising questions about the purposes of this contract.

DataOne’s articles of organization filed with the Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxation list the company’s address as a residence in Waldorf, Maryland — the same home owned by Elton and Sharon Stokes, according to the Charles County Treasurer’s Office.

DataOne IT Solutions is listed as a valid state vendor with the Mississippi Department of Information Technology Services, with Stokes listed as a contact for the company in one report and Semper listed in another. However, the phone number listed for the company in both reports is the same, and a call using that contact information was answered by Stokes.

Contact Mollie Bryant at mbryant2@gannett.com or 601-961-7251. Follow @MollieEBryant on Twitter.

A closer look at the contracts:

March 2014 to June 2014: $98,500 contract with Blue Sky to conduct an organizational review with day-to-day management. In May, the state education board approved increasing the amount of the contract from $29,050.
July 2014 to June 2015: $98,500 contract with Blue Sky to continue organizational review and oversight of the Office of Management Information Systems with same duties as the company’s first contract, including the creation of a customer service plan.
August 2014 to December 2014: $48,000 to Elton Stokes Jr. to review data requirements and build data management resources.
October 2014 to June 2015: $48,500 contract with Blue Sky to create an IT strategy and develop a state accountability reporting application.
During the state education board’s January 2015 meeting, members approved a contract with John Q. Porter for $96,454.40 and a contract with Elton Stokes Jr. for $93,009.60, both to conduct organizational reviews of the Office of Technology and Strategic Services.
July 2015 to June 2016: $73,632 contract with Elton Stokes Jr. to assist with the development of an IT strategy and monitor MDE’s data warehouse system. In October, the state education board approved extending the contract from December 2015 to June 2016 and increasing the total cost by $25,577.
January 2016 to June 2016: $48,240 contract with Sharon Semper doing business as DataOne IT Solutions LLC to monitor the MDE data warehouse and develop an IT strategy.