The Facts on Anthony Silva’s Involvement with SUSD!

Timeline of Events for Anthony Silva’s Involvement with the Vision Quest and Career Pathways Charter School, and the Stockton Unified School Board.

Background: 

Research of public documents completed by Families for a Better School Board has found that former Stockton Mayor Anthony Silva, who formally was sentenced to one felony conflict-of-interest charge in 2019 for directing public funds to the Kids Club of Stockton and who pleaded no contest for providing alcohol to a minor, is involved in behind the scenes management of a nonprofit organization claiming to control Vision Quest and Career Pathways Charter School. 

In November, 2019 Maria Mendez forwarded a petition for Vision Quest and Career Pathways Charter School to the Superintendent of schools. The petition then moved forward for review by staff, and, despite staff recommendations against approving the charter, was approved by the Board of Trustees in January 2020. At the time of approval, Fostering Minds, Inc was registered as the non-profit operator of the school under the leadership of Manuel Casillas. (All of this information is available to the public in the School Board’s documentation from their meeting on January 7, 2020). See a timeline below for more details:

November 7, 2019 – Petition for charter school ‘Vision Quest & Career Pathways’ is submitted to SUSD leadership. (Maria Mendez forwards petition to John Deasy and Lange Luntao according to publicly available District document)

December 13, 2019 – Vision Quest and Career Pathways Charter hearing is held.

January 7, 2020 – Despite District internal analysis that “The Review Committee finds that this Charter presents significant risks to the District and does not meet the minimum adequate threshold required for charter school operation.” The Stockton Unified School Board approves ‘Vision Quest and Career Pathway Charter Petition to Establish the Vision Quest Charter School’

  • http://go.boarddocs.com/ca/susd/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=BJYNT75F56AC 
  • According to sources, board members all approve the charter petition, despite recommendations to the contrary by SUSD staff because Superintendent Deasy was attempting to build community with Board Trustees Mendez, Garcia, Mendez, and McBrian who favored the school. However, the public, SUSD staff, and several trustees were not aware of Anthony Silva’s involvement behind the scenes with the creation of the school.
  • Indication of reservations by some Board members can be found in the failed resolution put forward by Trustee Luntao that asks: “to approve the charter petition with the condition that the amended changes be addressed, reconciled or resolved.”

January 14, 2020 – Anthony Silva files non-profit with State of California called ‘Vision Quest Career Pathways’

February 13, 2020 – Anthony Silva’s associates, including Sharon Simas who was indicted with Silva due to involvement with ‘Stockton Kids Club,’ are registered with State of CA as non-profit.

August 7, 2020 – Anthony Silva and Sharon Simas and others at non-profit file lawsuit against Manual Casillas, in what appears to be a legal attempt to take over the charter school without consulting District authorities.

August 23, 2020 – Updated documentation is provided to the State, with Anthony Silva replacing Manual Casillas as the ‘Agent for Service of Process’

September 2, 2020 – According to sources, Manual Casillas files charges against Anthony Silva with local authorities. These charges have not yet been made public, but were disclosed to Families for a Better School board by a local whistleblower.

September 11, 2020 – The case Silva has brought that attempts to use a legal strategy to wrest control of the school from Casillas will go to court on September 9/11/20 in San Joaquin County

  • This despite the fact that there has been no public revision of the terms granted to the charter by the Stockton Unified School Board.
  • The attorney representing Anthony Silva and Sharon Simas (Douglas Srulowitz) is housed in the same building as Visions Quest Career Pathways, and is located across the street from Silva’s youth activity complex. The leases and offices were set up by an associate of Silva’s. 
  • Douglas Srulowitz is representing Trustee Cecilia Mendez in a lawsuit against SUSD for an alleged incident involving the 209 Times — also involved in activities controlling Trustees Mendez, Garcia, Mendez and McBrian.  Reports from Vision Quest Career Pathways on September 10, 2020 indicate that Kathy Garcia is visiting Srulowitz’s office as well.

Background: Anthony Silva is the former Mayor of Stockton, California. In 2016, Silva was defeated by then Councilman Michael Tubbs, and left office under a cloud of scandal and legal charges. In January of 2020, evidence shows that Silva, along with allies at the site ‘209 Times’ https://209times.com/, began to control and coordinate with a bare majority of the Stockton USD School Board to influence decisions in the political and financial interests of Former Mayor Silva and a number of his political allies.

Key Facts:

  1. Anthony Silva is influencing the majority of the Stockton School Board for political and financial gain.
  2. Silva has worked with the board to pass a charter school petition he was involved with, force the resignation of a superintendent, attempt to hire a former Superintendent who served while Silva was on the board, and hire a ‘Equity consultant’ when the attempt to hire his chosen Superintendent failed.
  3. Anthony Silva is a registered agent of a non-profit with the same name as the ‘Vision Quest & Career Pathways’ charter school approved by the school board in January 2020, and has shown intent to profit off of the local charter school in a manner consistent with previous charges filed against him during his involvement with the Stockton Kids Club 

General Timeline for SUSD Board Activities Related to Silva:

February 24, 2020 – board members hired outside legal counsel, law-firm Burke, Williams, & Sorenson, with approval of just 4 board members, and no public viewing of resolution or contract in advance of the meeting at a great cost to the District. 

On March 10, 2020 – board members began meeting in closed sessions to ‘evaluate’ the Superintendent despite giving him a positive review and a raise just months before to reward progress in schools. The Board also reaffirmed its approval of a contract for hundreds of thousands more dollars to keep their extra law firm in place to help them perpetuate their political agenda while the District faces a multi-million-dollar budget shortfall coming out of the pandemic.

On March 26, 2020 – 4 board members create confusion among parents when they chose not to give emergency authority to the Superintendent and voted against a resolution communicating that schools would remain closed, even though it was mandated by the State. They chose to put their secondary issues ahead of sending a clear message to students and families about what to expect from the School District at a critical time.

Later, on April 21, 2020 – during a time where their energy and focus should have been on the health and safety of our children, they maneuvered behind closed doors to force the resignation of the Superintendent and called an emergency meeting, in violation of the Brown Act, to formally accept it. At this meeting, which was held via tele-conference, over 100 public comments were submitted in support of the Superintendent but few were read. Over 1400 citizens signed a petition disavowing the Board’s habit of cycling through Superintendents at a cost to our children… but these pleas were ignored.

On April 28, 2020 – shortly after this decision, they attempted to hire a former superintendent who left SUSD under a cloud of scandal as a consultant to them.

On June 9, 2020 an expensive one-year contract was approved for a new interim Superintendent, which will be paid at the same time as the board continues to pay the former Superintendent’s salary through June of 2021.

On June 12, 2020 following the interim superintendent’s contract a consultant contract was put forward by Maria Mendez and Kathy Garcia to hire John Ramirez Jr., former superintendent from Alisal School District near Salinas. 

In his past position as a school superintendent, he was investigated for sexual harassment of an employee and misuse of the district credit card.  His conduct even made national news.  This Des Moines Register article describes the problems with his tenure with the Alisal School District:

He also drew the public spotlight on himself in the admitted personal use of district credit cards and a sexual harassment complaint filed by a former district employee.   

John Ramirez Jr. is an associate of Anthony Silva’s and was put forward as the consultant to the interim superintendent by Trustees Maria Mendez and Kathy Garcia at Silva’s urging.

Extended Timeline With links to Stockton Record Articles:

March – Four Board Members vote to not officially suspend classes at the outset of the pandemic, despite State and County Orders to do so. 

April – Board accepts resignation of John Deasy despite public opposition (with no discussion or explanation), in the middle of the pandemic on a tele-conference call, with over a year left on his contract.

May – Same Group of Board Members attempts to hire Jack Mclaughlin, former Superintendent who resigned in disgrace in Stockton, to interim position. Eventually withdraws name do to continuous public outcry.

Late May & June – Board finally compromises and hires local former principal Brian Biederman as Superintendent. What is not noted at the time, is that a man named John Ramirez Jr. is hired as an equity consultant to Biederman at Board’s direction.

July – Recall Effort Launched against Two SUSD Trustees involved in forced Resignation of Superintendent Deasy

August – Mendez and McBrian target Trustee Luntao with ‘investigation’ into former work with Aspire charter schools, with unsubstantiated conflict of interest claims (they do this in coordination with a local blog run by allies of former mayor Anthony Silva, in an attempt to distract from recall campaign). They proceed with this, despite the fact that the board voted 7-0 to approve the charter on the vote in question (making the alleged vote by Luntao inconsequential at the time). The 4 board members vote to approve funding for this investigation, and spend significant board meeting time on it, in the weeks leading up to school reopening with very little communication about the district’s plan to reopen schools.

5 hours of audio from the most recent meeting: 

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Paid for by Families for a Better School Board, for the Recall of Maria Mendez and Scot McBrian. FPPC #1426958