RUSD ends contract with PBCG

The Racine Unified School District (RUSD) Board of Education settled its negotiations with Public Business Consulting Group (PBCG) Monday, terminating the contract signed by former Supt. Tom Hicks, who resigned in August when details of PBCG's bonus payments were revealed.

The board's vote Monday to terminate was 7-2, with Brian Dey and Julie McKenna voting no, apparently opposed to paying PBCG any more money. No details of any financial settlement were revealed. PBCG will help the district transition from outsourced services to district employees by June 30.

The Journal Times reports that the district will pay PBCG "more than $750,000," but avoids paying up to $4 million in incentive pay, for backing out of the five-year contract after 2 1/2 years. Their story is HERE.

The Journal Sentinel looks at it another way, and says the district is paying PBCG $1.3 million previously owed in salaries and commissions, plus $350,000 more to keep them working until June 30. Their story is HERE.

The board issued the following statement:

"We believe that it is in the best interest of the community and its taxpayers to finalize and announce the settlement of these negotiations. The people of Racine deserve to know the resolution. This relationship has yielded many positive achievements that have and will continue to allow the District to better manage its resources", said Tony Baumgardt, RUSD Board President.

"The relationship saved or created new revenues for RUSD and these amounts have been verified by the recent investigation conducted by Reinhart Boerner Van Duren and Deloitte Touche.

"Based on this conclusion, RUSD and PBCG have worked together to develop an amicable end to the current outsourcing agreement. Both parties have agreed to a transition agreement that will facilitate the smoothest possible transition to district-employed staff, which will occur by June 30, 2008. The efforts of PBCG between now and June 30 will be focused on a number of key projects, the largest of which are the ERP implementation , system knowledge transference to RUSD staff, and the placing of the Food Service contract out for competitive bidding under the direction of CFO David Hazen.

"On behalf of the RUSD BOE," said Tony Baumgardt, "I would like to thank the community for their counsel, support, and patience as we worked our way through the investigation and the negotiations."