By Jeff Lipton
An anonymous e-mail sent to the Board of Education and district administrators accused Gallagher of a conflict of interest by "working for a vendor of the school district" and hiding that relationship from school officials. The e-mail indicated that he was using his seat on the school board to push for college courses offered at Long Beach High School by Syracuse University, where Gallagher serves as a curriculum associate.
Gallagher vehemently denied that he committed any impropriety and is confident he will be cleared of any wrongdoing by district officials, who are looking into the allegations.
"What I've been told now is that there's no impropriety involved here," he said.
He said when he ran for school board six years ago, he encouraged the school district to add more college courses to the curriculum, but insisted that he is not benefiting at all by the relationship between the university and the high school.
He said technically he doesn't work for Syracuse University and is considered what he termed a "1099 employee who is paid a consultant's fee for working for them. I have no vested interest in Syracuse University," Gallagher said. "I have absolutely nothing to gain by doing this, no money, no bonus, nothing extra. I am not paid by the Long Beach school system."
The anonymous e-mail stated: "Upon being elected [to the school board], he strenuously lobbied the high school principal, Nicholas Restivo, to begin offering courses offered by the Syracuse University Project Advance [SUPA]. Prior to his becoming a trustee, the school district had no relationship with Syracuse University. At no time did Mr. Gallagher reveal to the [high school] principal or his fellow school board members that he was on the payroll of Syracuse University. He has been serving as a paid trainer of Long Beach High School teachers and as the local overseer of the SUPA program."
Gallagher said he has no idea who's the author of the e-mail, which was also sent to the Herald, but expressed that it may have been politically motivated because it came only weeks before the school board election.
Gallagher denied the e-mail's assertions that he hid the fact that he is connected with Syracuse University from the board and district administrators. "The Board of Education knew about it when I ran six years ago and again three years ago," he said. "There was no effort on my part to hide anything. All of the school board members knew it from Day One."
He added that he was not the one who recommended SUPA to the principal, even though he campaigned six years ago on the idea of adding college courses.
He said it never came up for a vote before the board and if it did, he would have recused himself.
He said he hooked up with the university when he retired as a high school principal about six years ago.
As a paid consultant of the university, Gallagher said he oversees a course called Public Policy 101, in which he visits 45 high schools a year, including Long Beach, to observe teachers to make sure they are properly instructing the course.
"Of the six Syracuse University courses taught at Long Beach, I'm involved in only one," he said. "I'm not to solicit anyone to go to Syracuse University."
Under SUPA, classes are taught to Long Beach seniors and juniors who then get college credits upon successful completion of the course.
Long Beach Superintendent Dr. Robert Greenberg said he has looked into the allegations with the district's lawyers, adding, "I don't view it as a really big issue." He said the district does not have a formal contract with Syracuse University about the college courses offered at Long Beach High School because the district does not pay the university any money. The students pay the university for the courses that are taken. But the district is now considering formalizing the arrangement, Greenberg said, adding that he has touched base with several districts, and some have contracts while others don't. Long Beach has similar affiliations with three or four other colleges and universities, district officials said.
In the roughly five years that Gallagher has been connected with the university, he visited Long Beach High School four times to observe teachers instructing the college courses, said Greenberg. Long Beach teachers are trained by Syracuse University to instruct the college-level courses.
"His role would be to make certain that the courses we're offering to students meet college requirements," said Greenberg. "From my perspective, there's nothing hidden about it.
"And we don't pay him whatsoever for his relationship with Syracuse," the superintendent added.
The superintendent said Gallagher mentioned that he worked for the university many times in public and never hid his relationship with the university. "Pat is pretty proud of his affiliation with the university," Greenberg said.
School board President Frank Alvarado also said Gallagher never hid his relationship with Syracuse University from the board. "In fact, he's been very open about it, and he often talks about it in public," Alvarado said.
Alvarado agreed that it may be a good idea to draw up a contract with Syracuse University to avoid similar problems in the future.
"There's always stuff like this coming out [as an election nears]," said Alvarado. "But as a board, we still need to do our due diligence to make sure there's nothing there to compromise the district in any way."
He said Gallagher may want to shelve his visits to Long Beach High School as Syracuse University's paid consultant to remove any appearance of impropriety, "even though we don't believe any impropriety has been committed."
Gallagher said that's no longer an issue because he has already informed university officials that he will no longer visit Long Beach High School as a paid consultant for the university.
Gallagher, who also works as an adjunct professor at Nassau Community College, is seeking reelection to a third three-year term on the Long Beach school board on May 20. Two newcomers, Dr. Dennis Ryan and Alex Rubin, are making their first bid for a trustee post, in the at-large election in which the top two vote-getters among the three candidates will win seats on the board. The decision by trustee Ruth Kaleko not to seek reelection to the board has left a seat vacant and up for grabs.
"I've worked very hard and I'm very proud that I brought the college programs to Long Beach for the betterment of our children," Gallagher said. "And there has never been anything hidden here; everyone knew about it. And if there had ever been a vote I would of course have recused myself. The anonymous e-mails are bogus with a lot of mistruths it."
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