There is a cash-starved world of the classroom, where students feast on the fine delicacies of square pizza, pop tarts, chilled fruit, chef salads, chicken rice bowls and whatever else the cafeteria lady decides to whip up and teachers who are in dire need of raises who ask for help to furnish their classrooms. And then you have the credit-card-rich world of the executive offices where some administrators dine at expensive restaurants, enjoy higher end hotels and delivery services like DoorDash, and rack-up expensive airfare.
The Lantern first blew the whistle over these expenditures earlier this year when a post circulated on Facebook over a credit card charge from an expensive Brazilian steakhouse. Many were upset over the expenditures while others asked, where’s the oversight?
An editorial written earlier this year and posted on The Post and Courier’s website asked, “Can we trust school districts to oversee employee credit card spending?” The editorial continued, “The problem isn’t that there’s anything inherently corrupt about these so-called P-cards – essentially government credit cards issued to some elected officials and employees. It’s that by functioning the way they were intended to – eliminating the need to get a purchase order and a paper check cut for each purchase they make – the cards make corruption so much easier.”
If posting credit card statements online brings outrage from taxpayers…why even bother to post them? According to Laurens County School District, “South Carolina law requires that school districts post expenditures of $100 or more as well as credit statements each month.” Statements are posted to comply with Spending Transparency Act No. 23. Thankfully, we have transparency with statements posted online but who monitors the spending above the district level? Unfortunately, we were not able to locate that little piece of handy dandy information, but we will keep digging.
The Lantern decided to follow-up on these credit card expenditures from other school districts in the state to see who landed on the naughty list. We will list some of these purchases below (Note, this is public information found online):
Empire Pizza- $512.48 LA Fitness Decatur- $89.98
Gaylord Opry Resort- $1699.49 Caesars Hotel and Casino- $1558.98
DD DoorDash Rush’s- $194.82 Sheraton Grand Chicago- $1208.48
DoorDash Little CAE- $358.62 Courtyard Orlando- $621.00
Lizards Thicket Blythewood- $837.32 Gaylord Texan front- $720.75
Sheraton Salt Lake City- $632.84 Saluda Valley Country Club- $46.80
DoorDash Popeyes- $19.66 Chester Golf Pro shop- $36.00
Uncle Jims Worm Farm- $224.49 HERO Korean & Japanese- $ 482.20
Marriott Chrlston River- $582.34 Beachcove Resort- $501.76
And much more. We kept the list short for viewing constraints. Public information was gathered from school district websites.
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