Dena Levitz, The Examiner
2008-01-26 08:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

Washington, D.C. -

D.C.'s public school system is spending millions to send students who haven't proven they live within the city to expensive private and out-of-state public facilities, according to a new Inspector General audit.

The audit concluded that D.C. Public Schools spent $2.7 million to educate 166 students with questionable residency status between October 2006 and March 2007, not including the cost of transportation.

By law, the District must pay tuition for residents to receive special education outside of its facilities if the public school system cannot provide for them adequately.

But the requirement that the student prove he or she resides in the District is in many cases being inadequately enforced, according to Monica Graves, director for school audits with in the Inspector General's Office.

"We think that there's a high possibility that they don't live in D.C.," she said of the 166 students.

Auditors told The Examiner the problem could very well still be going on, but that won't be clear until this year's enrollment audit comes out next week.

Sources speculated that families living outside D.C. could be trying to take advantage of the larger-than-average number of students the city pays to educate at more than 400 highly specialized private facilities. Currently, about 2,400 disabled and mentally ill children fall into this category.

The audit found that D.C. code stipulates students enrolled in the city's public and charter schools provide proof each year they live in the city. Yet the same standards don't apply when it comes to private placements.

Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee's chief of staff, Lisa Ruda, wrote in a Jan. 14 response that school officials would develop a plan to fix the hole as well as to boot students out of schools and stop tuition payments if they haven't verified their residency.

Auditors criticized DCPS officials, however, for not explaining whether they would investigate the actual residences of the students in question and then try to recoup the money.

Calls to Rhee's spokeswoman Mafara Hobson were not returned Friday.

dlevitz@dcexaminer.com