KLEPT, did Serpico campaign give candidate $10,000?

In September, 2006 Citizens to Elect Ron Serpico, Sr. Inc wrote two checks to Ronald M. Serpico, Sr. totaling $10,000 for "loan repayments". The first check was for $2,500 on September 15, 2006 and the second check was for $7,500 on September 26, 2006.

Candidates sometimes loan their campaigns money.

But according to Serpico's disclosure forms none of the campaigns $32,018.54 debt was held by Serpico.

Serpico's campaign owes:

• $9,500+ Anthony Bruno and Illinois Development Services Corp.
• $4,500 Josesp Giglio
• $4,500 Alfred Ronan
• $4,500 Swinford Partnership, Ltd
• $4,500 Louis P. Vitullo
• $4,500 ziolkowski porter damato + associates llc

Serpico's campaign had the same debt before and after the reporting period.

Did Serpico just give himself $10,000 from his campaign committee?

The Illinois State Board of Elections does little to enforce election law, except hassling campaigns about submitting their forms on-time. So if a candidate skimmed money from a campaign the board probably wouldn't look into it unless someone filed a complaint.

[UPDATE: Serpico also gave his campaign money during the same reporting period, but did not report it as a loan.

[On July 30, 2006 Serpico gave the campaign $10,000. On August 30, 2006 Serpico gave the campaign $7,500. So Serpico gave $17,500 before taking $10,000 as a loan repayment.

[But later Serpico gave to the campaign claiming he was repaying a loan from the campaign to the candidate. On October 19, 2006 the candidate paid back a $7,500 loan. And on December 1, 2006 Serpico paid $2,500 back to the campaign that had been loaned to him.

[Serpico also made a $7,500 contribution to the campaign on October 8, 2006.]

ED, school report cards late but should be arriving soon

Riverside/Brookfield Landmark (Bob Uphues):

Anyone wondering just how their local school fared on the 2006 school report card will have to wait at least a few more weeks. While school officials have been provided with test results for individual students in the form of large, unwieldy spreadsheets, report cards, featuring demographic data and information on whether schools met adequate yearly progress (AYP) according to standards set by the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, won't be available to the general public until March 6 at the earliest.

However, a spokesperson at the Illinois State Board of Education said last week that schools and parents should be receiving copies of the school report cards prior to that March 6 date, and final results should be in that hands of ISBE officials within the next two weeks.

The ISBE claimed the delay was caused by needing to re-score the Prairie State Achievement Exam (PSAE). But the article doesn't really explain why it needed to be rescored.

A few years ago I covered an education meeting and one of the gripes of local superintendents was the error rate in the ISBE processing teacher credentials. Maybe Sen. Kimberly Lightford will be able to improve the accuracy of the ISBE if she's appointed the state superintendent of education.