Saturday, September 12, 2015

C. J. Huff's last desperate attempts to woo Webb City superintendent

In a last-ditch desperate attempt to keep Webb City from dropping out of Bright Futures USA, former Joplin R-8 Superintendent argued that Webb City's departure would hurt the kids and even tried flattery of Superintendent Tony Rossetti, but it was too little, too late.

The fear of Huff and Bright Futures USA official is that Webb City's decision to leave BFUSA, combined with the unfavorable publicity surrounding the hiring of Huff as a consultant could trigger the beginning of a domino effect that will result in other schools dropping their affiliation with the not-for-profit.

And they have every reason to be afraid. The Turner Report has learned of three area school districts in Jasper and Newton counties that are considering pulling out of Bright Futures.

Rossetti was the only BFUSA board member to vote against hiring Huff on two occasions. The Webb City Sentinel reports that votes were taken on August 28 and September 4. Between the initial vote and the final one, Huff put on a full court press to win Rossetti's favor, including an out of left field mention during an hour-long interview (the video accompanies this post) three days before the final vote.

Instead of following his usual practice of mouthing platitudes about Bright Futures and how it helps children, Huff said the following:

Tony Rossetti, the superintendent at Webb City, I think a lot of him, and he made a comment that "I don't really care if we see data results or not; at the end of the day, we're helping kids and families and that's what matters most. We're supporting these kids and families and nothing bad can come out of that. (The comments can be found just after the 43 minute mark.)

The video shoutout was just one of many efforts Huff made between the two votes to try to win over Rossetti.

Not only were the efforts unsuccessful, but the Webb City Bright Futures Board voted unanimously to drop the Bright Futures affiliation and rename the organization.

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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bless his little heart, CJ seems to be trying really hard. Maybe it's all for the kids?

Anonymous said...

Hey, can Blight Futures pick up the tab for all the damn fundraisers that we get hit with? I'm tired of answering the door with kids begging to buy crap I don't want.

Talk to me, Blight Futures.

Anonymous said...

posted on Facebook

Bright Futures East Newton has decided to move toward becoming an independent local organization, inspiring community partnerships to meet the needs of the children in our district. We will no longer use the name of Bright Future East Newton, and will be transitioning to East Newton United. We are very grateful to Bright Futures USA for assisting our community and school district in establishing an organizational structure to help our students. For all our volunteers, donors, teachers, staff, students, and community partners it will be business as usual for our organization. The only difference is that our name will change to East Newton United, patrons will see no changes in the way the organization operates. East Newton United will do our best to meet the needs of students in the East Newton School District.


East Newton United Advisory Board

Anonymous said...

Not sure where to address this question, so I'll place it here to see if anyone knows the answer.

The major charities, ie Red Cross, United Way, etc, have to post their administrative costs as a percentage of collections. I'm sure this is true of smaller organizations, as well.

I would like to see the percentage of collections that are forwarded to the "clients", and how much is kept for administration. Is there any way to collect this information from BF USA?

Anonymous said...

The questions 909 AM asks are answered on the IRS 990 filings which are public and available on the internet.

See the post and comments http://rturner229.blogspot.com/2015/09/documents-indicate-tornado-relief-money.html