[June 20, 2011] DPS board member says Roy Roberts lost cool in meeting Tweet Jun 20, 2011 (Detroit Free Press - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Detroit Public Schools board member LaMar Lemmons left an 8 a.m. meeting early after he said Detroit Public Schools Emergency Manager Roy Roberts blew up in the meeting. Roberts called the meeting with board members to discuss a plan to restructure the governing of DPS. An 11 a.m. news conference is scheduled with Gov. Rick Snyder and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan -- who is expected to take part remotely from Washington, D.C.-- to discuss the changes. About 45 schools in the district, and possibly some from other districts, will be placed under the authority of the Michigan Department of Education. These are schools that perform in the bottom 5% in the state Roberts told the board members, Lemmons said. Roberts said $200 million of the district's deficit would go away and the books will be balanced in five years under the plan. "How?" Lemmons said he asked Roberts. "Is the state going to assume the deficit?" That is when Roberts blew up and said, "What do you care?" Lemmons said. "I'm not here to make this district solvent so you can get back in office, I'm here to educate kids, " Roberts said, according to Lemmons. Lemmons said he responded, "The district has been under control of the state for nine of the last 12 years. The reason you're here is because we're not solvent." Roberts stormed out of the meeting at that point and said board members could follow him to his office if they had additional questions, Lemmons said. Five of the 11 board members went to Roberts' office. Roberts had no immediate response to Lemmons' comments and a Free Press reporter was not allowed into the closed-door meeting. Additionally, Roberts said that the authority controlling the failing schools would get money from other organizations such as the California-based Broad Foundation, which was one of the groups that helped pay former DPS Emergency Manager Robert Bobb's living expenses. The five board members left the meeting with Roberts at about 9:15 a.m. today. They said they don't have all the details of the plan and could not determine whether will work for district. However, there are some elements of the restructuring that they said they support. School Board President Anthony Adams said the board is in favor of the following changes discussed during this morning's meeting: -- A goal to raise money so every DPS student can have a 2-year scholarship to college -- A campaign to attract students to the district -- Site-based management that would give principals more power over school budgets -- Rebidding some contracts within the district. Board members said that they think a lot of this plan amounts to an experiment with the district that they hope pays off. "This is the new model that they're implementing," board member Carol Banks said, referring to Snyder and Duncan. "It's never been done before." The board members said they are not planning to attend the 11 a.m. news conference at Renaissance High School in Detroit. To see more of the Detroit Free Press, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.freep.com Copyright (c) 2011, Detroit Free Press Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit www.mctinfoservices.com. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]