CPS journey prices soar, together with to unique locations, inspector basic finds

CHICAGO — As Chicago Public Schools confronted a significant finances shortfall for the upcoming Fiscal Year, shedding greater than 160 staff and eliminating one other 200 vacant positions previous to the beginning of the 2025-26 college 12 months, CPS staff elevated their in a single day journey spending by greater than double during the last six fiscal years, in accordance with the CPS Inspector General.

In a prolonged report launched Wednesday, the inspector basic discovered “questionable, excessive and even exorbitant post-pandemic travel spending by CPS employees,” citing about $7.7 million in in a single day journey bills for FY 2024 in comparison with about $3.6 million for FY 2019.

Among the highlighted journey expenditures within the report are journeys to skilled improvement conferences in Las Vegas and elsewhere that included:

• 600 staff.
• 140 colleges and departments.
• $1.5 million spent in two years.

The identical conferences in Chicago, nevertheless, had few attendees, the inspector basic stated.

“A broken travel expense process that opened the door to travel abuses” fueled the issue, CPS Inspector General Philip Wagenknecht’s probe discovered. The report included beneficial journey reforms “to save CPS resources and instill accountability.”

“Over and over, CPS employees booked trips using CPS funds without required pre-approvals,
exceeded CPS spending limits on hotel rooms and airfare, and enjoyed out-of-town activities
of dubious necessity or value to students — all as CPS drew closer and closer to a budget
crisis,” the report states.

In response to the inspector basic’s report, CPS issued a short lived journey freeze, which was first communicated in August and clarified in late October with a memo from CPS Interim Superintendent Dr. Macquline King explaining that “CPS-funded staff travel not tied to student activities was frozen with limited exceptions.”

Other particulars

The report cited in a single day journey expenditures from FY 2019 to FY 2024. According to an evaluation by the inspector basic’s Performance Analysis Unit, the report concludes that of the roughly $23.6 million spent in in a single day travel-related bills throughout that six-year interval, about $14.5 million have been spent in FY 2023 and FY 2024 alone.

Those bills have been principally for out-of-town worker skilled improvement seminars or in a single day scholar outings, the inspector basic says.

Just among the particular journey bills cited within the report embody the next:

• A CPS principal traveled to Las Vegas a number of instances to attend an expert improvement convention with out CPS approval, in a single case reserving an unapproved suite at a Las Vegas lodge for himself and his spouse that value greater than $400 per night time, despite the fact that the convention was at a special lodge, began two days after they arrived and ended after their six-day go to concluded.
• One trainer’s $4,700, seven-day journey to a luxurious Hawaiian resort for a four-day skilled improvement seminar.
• Multi-day training retreats at spa resorts or giant lodge complexes that have been lower than 50 miles from work websites, subsequently not lodging bills that ought to’ve been funded by CPS below district journey insurance policies.
• Inflated airfare and room charges effectively outdoors spending limits set within the CPS Travel Policy, together with a number of $1,000-per-person round-trip home flights and room charges of $500-plus and even $900-plus per night time.
• Private sedans by way of a limo service to take staff to and from Chicago airports.
• Hidden journey company charges of as much as 20% tacked onto CPS journey, billed by means of journey companies.

The report reveals that about $3.6 million have been spent on in a single day journey in FY 2019. That whole dipped to $1.8 million in FY 2020 and $0.3 million in FY 2021, as a result of pandemic. But in a single day journey expenditures climbed again to $3.4 million in FY 2022, $6.9 million in FY 2023 and $7.7 million in FY 2024, greater than double journey expenditures from the primary 12 months of the examine.

Trip to Egypt canceled

The genesis of the probe was a criticism that one elementary college paid greater than $20,000 to 1 vendor for employees journey to Egypt, despite the fact that it had not acquired the required approval for the journey, and had undertaken different “lavish staff outings.”

When it acquired this information, the inspector basic says, CPS canceled the Egypt journey someday earlier than it was scheduled to depart and subsequently canceled three of the required vendor’s abroad outings, two of which additionally had not been permitted.

According to the report, these cancelations resulted in CPS shedding $52,980 in pay as you go journey bills, although the seller did give CPS a $25,580 credit score for future journey companies.

An inspector basic investigation, the report states, finally revealed that eight colleges had used greater than $142,000 in CPS funds to pay the seller for 15 workers journeys to Finland, Estonia, Egypt and South Africa for “professional development and school visits.”

According to the report, a high-ranking CPS official questioned whether or not the abroad journeys have been even obligatory, telling the inspector basic, “Why can’t this be done in the United States?”

Shortly afterwards, the report says, the inspector basic acquired one other criticism concerning the aforementioned CPS principal’s a number of journeys to Las Vegas for skilled improvement conferences with out CPS approval.

The inspector basic was later advised, the report states, that curiosity on this Las Vegas convention and different out-of-town variations of it organized by the identical vendor “spread like wildfire” round CPS. According to an inspector basic investigation, greater than 600 staff from 140 colleges or departments spent greater than $1.5 million in taxpayer funds on such seminars from 2022-24.

Nearly 90% of CPS attendees stayed in lodge rooms that exceeded CPS spending limits, and at the very least two dozen took round-trip flights from Chicago to Las Vegas costing greater than $1,000 every, the report states.

‘Deficient travel procedures’

The report states, “Faced with this sample of problematic spending, the inspector basic sought to establish the underlying reason behind the journey excesses by launching a efficiency overview into districtwide CPS journey procedures and located them sorely missing.

“CPS travel guidelines, travel training, the travel approval process, and travel bookkeeping were all so deficient that they created vulnerabilities for abuse and fraud, the performance review found.”

According to the report, the inspector basic decided that CPS “had its eye on the wrong ball” when it got here to journey bills, with a workforce of staff “scouring” receipts for small reimbursements like meals and Ubers however paying little consideration to CPS funds made on to journey distributors for “far larger-ticket items” like airfare and lodge rooms.

The report says the inspector basic discovered that journey abuses have been in the end on account of “deficient CPS travel procedures” that fell into one in all three classes: insufficient written insurance policies, steering and coaching; a flawed approval course of; and a poor bookkeeping system.

According to the report, after the inspector basic started investigating journey bills, CPS issued a procedural reform in July 2024. But the inspector basic discovered the reform “failed to capture hundreds of employees who used other Account/Category combinations for their travel over a seven-month period and thereby avoided the travel approval process entirely.”

CPS response

The district responded by saying new controls and procedures have been put in place and non-essential, non-student-related journey has been suspended.

“Effective October 29, CPS is restricting nearly all employee travel and has formed a Travel Review Committee, effective November 2025. Travel controls, transparency, and auditability will improve with the implementation of the new Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) financial system that is currently underway,” a CPS spokesperson advised WGN Investigates.

You can click on HERE to view your complete inspector basic report.