MPS misses first set of new financial reporting deadlines established by state

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- It has been more than a year since Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) was supposed to turn in financial data to state officials. 

The district's failure to turn in 2022 financial data that was due last September boiled over in May, when the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) publicly blasted the delays, which threatened the state's ability to give all Wisconsin school districts an accurate estimate of what their 2024-25 state aid would be.

The DPI then worked with the district to establish a new timeline for MPS to turn those reports in as part of a corrective action plan. 

MPS has now missed the first of those deadlines, which called for the district to provide an audited version of those records by last Friday. DPI spokesman Chris Bucher confirmed MPS has yet to submit those records, saying the district's outside auditor was still reviewing them.

"We continue working closely with new leadership at MPS to push through serious accountability measures," Bucher said in an email Wednesday. "We are making slow, but steady progress toward the goals of the corrective action plan."

MPS school board member Henry Leonard said he was confident the district's financial office was moving in the right direction after hiring of Aycha Sawa as the new chief financial officer. Sawa was previously the City of Milwaukee's comptroller.

"I think it's gonna be very challenging. I believe that we have the right people there," Leonard said. "I do know that they are working. There's a different culture and attitude in that department."

The school board voted Tuesday to approve a $200,000 salary for Sawa. Interim Superintendent Eduardo Galvan initially proposed giving four other high-level administrators raises to match Sawa's $200,000 salary, but he backed off and had the item taken off Tuesday's agenda amid public backlash. 

Mistakes the previous administration made led to MPS having more than $42 million withheld from this year's state aid as an adjustment to make up for overpayments the district previously received due to bad data it gave the state.

Leonard said he believed the new finance staff was still finding new challenges as it sifts through past records.

"What I think is happening is they're starting to uncover a lot, and they're reporting stuff," Leonard said. "And then, there's more that shows up."

Leonard said he was hopeful the board would soon get an update from Sawa and the financial office about what they've recently learned.

"I'm looking forward to seeing where we are, to make sure that we definitely cover this," he said. "Because we still have a lot of parts of the puzzle to fix at MPS."