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Ruth: A very profitable consulting gig

 
Published Dec. 1, 2015

It is both a blessing and burden to have been in this business for more than 40 years. I've seen variations on this story too many times. Yet the same nagging issue lingers — What in heaven's name were you thinking? Consider this the universal question of journalism.

The Tampa Bay Times' Marlene Sokol recently reported on Rod and Mel Jurado, who own a consulting firm that has taken in $35,000 from the Hillsborough County School District for some serious professional chin-rubbing while also petitioning the School Board to oversee as many as seven charter schools.

The name of the Jurados' company is (ahem) The Profitable Group. Gee, no kidding.

To date, The Profitable Group has collected more than $35,000 from Hillsborough County taxpayers. That includes consulting with Hillsborough superintendent Jeff Eakins on developing a new superintendent evaluation form to the profitable tune of $11,500. Indeed, the contract with The Profitable Group didn't even appear on the School Board agenda until after the consulting work was completed, and even then the name of the company was never disclosed. You may insert: A) a Duh, B) a headslap, C) a hearty harrumph, or D) all of the above.

The Profitable Group also collected a public check to hold inane School Board member retreats in Ocala and Brooksville. And given the continued dysfunction by the board it would not be unreasonable to ask the Jurados for a refund.

Meanwhile, the couple won a board vote on Oct. 13 to launch four new charter schools with plans in the works to add three more charter school licenses.

What were all these people — the Jurados, Eakins, the School Board — thinking? Who knows? Let us count the ways.

It never dawned on Eakins to be more transparent by informing the School Board they were about to approve a lucrative consulting contract for the Jurados who also had other business before the board to win the charter school business

Oh and while we're at it, it never dawned on Eakins, who has spent his entire adult life in education, that he couldn't figure out an evaluation form himself without the help of a hand-holding consultant?

It never dawned on the Jurados to disclose their conflict of interest as consultants while also advocating for their charter school licenses?

It never dawned on the School Board to ask who was the recipient of the consulting contracts? It never dawned on Eakins to tell them?

Are you getting the feeling there's not a lot of intellectual curiosity going on here?

And it never dawned on any of these people that "retreats" are little more than cover for consultants to stage big ticket dubious functions to tell people stuff they already know?

Over the summer and into autumn, the Jurados conducted retreats with Eakins and the School Board to discuss strategic planning, attitude, appropriate behavior, communication, problem solving and conflict resolution — you know, all the stuff that ought to be part of the job description of the superintendent and School Board members.

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Really now, if Eakins and the board need to pay tens of thousands of dollars to consultants to teach them about strategic planning, problem solving and conflict resolution, they probably shouldn't have their jobs in the first place.

Pay no attention to that last paragraph. It might only encourage Eakins and the board to hire the The (Very) Profitable Group once more to figure it all out.