Former SBCSC CFO comes forward to address allegations about her past work, Brown Admin Building project
SAINT JOSEPH COUNTY, Ind. -- The former CFO of the South Bend Community School Corporation, Kareemah Fowler, came forward Monday evening and set the record straight on accusations that involve her past work with the district.
She and her attorney held a press conference; showing roughly 40 presentation slides worth of information, crunching the numbers, and detailing virtually every aspect of the Brown Administration Building renovation.
"This is what we actually spent on the renovations," said Fowler as she pointed to her presentation.
$3.2 million, that's how much money Kareemah Fowler says the Brown Admin building renovation project actually cost.
But that's contrary to a previous statement made by the district's current CFO Ahnaf Tahmid, who previously commented on the ongoing investigation and said he found the project to be about $3 million over budget, a $5.7 million total, when he dug through the corporation's financial system.
He also alluded that the bidding process for the project violated some state statutes.
Fowler and her attorney say Tahmid was missing important context and came to an untrue conclusion that the corporation would later backtrack.
"From our perspective, Kareemah as CFO for the five years they're investigating, knows more about the ins and outs of operations and the finances of the school system more than anything," says Richard Nussbaum, Fowler's attorney.
This information came out after an April school board meeting when outside investigators hired by the corporation gave an update on the uncomplete investigation into the school's finances over the last five years.
"This investigation is all out of whack," Nussbaum says. "In investigation 101, you don't want to give out too much information while you're in the middle of an investigation.
Nussbaum went on to say that the team of investigators declined their offers to share their side of the story, and the facts about the project's costs that are public record.
"We're not making any of this stuff up, it's all out there," Nussbaum explains. "And she's able to accumulate and she hasn't even been in the school system for six to eight months."
He says he and Fowler have no interest in being a part of that investigation now, and no interest in pursuing a lawsuit.
He says he just wants the corporation to apologize to Fowler for their misleading statements about the integrity of her work.
"There's a way they can remedy that without having a lawsuit, but they haven't done it yet," says Nussbaum. "So, we're not going to preclude anything at this point in time. We don't think that's productive."