Mysanantonio.com is reporting that Manuel Isquierdo has withdrawn his candidacy for San Antonio Independent School District superintendent Friday after school board members received troubling news about his tenure in Tucson’s Sunnyside Unified School District.
According to the report, “Days after his name was made public, Isquierdo, the lone finalist for the position, was out of the running. Three SAISD trustees already had signaled waning support.”
“He felt like there was too much to overcome,” school board President Ed Garza said of public perception.
Just this past Monday, the school board voted 7-0 to name him as its lone finalist.
Garza said the board took a risk on a flawed candidate who had the potential to transform SAISD, according to the report.
Isquierdo is facing $150,000 in federal tax liens that he said stemmed from being forced to sell his California home at a $400,000 loss during the economic downturn. He lost his driver’s license for a time because of unpaid traffic tickets and his failure to appear in court according to Mysanantionio.com.
He had to return $12,545 in disallowed credit card charges to Sunnyside.
The board discovered also that a grand jury in Arizona had subpoenaed documents relating to Isquierdo, his wife and his work selling the laptop incentive program to other school districts. No charges were filed, but reportedly Isquierdo and his partners have benefitted from selling laptops to his own district in a computer give-away he created.
Isquierdo, who told Texas reporters Thursday that he has learned from past financial mistakes. Isquierdo is facing a foreclosure in Arizona on a house he and his wife bought in April 2011 for $1.15 million with only $5,000 cash down, according to public notices in Arizona and records on file with LexisNexis, a commercial research service.
“If you had taken a $400,000 loss on a home, would it be fair to say you have ‘learned from your mistake’ when you move into a $1.15 million golf community home with nearly no money down?” asked a San Antonio financial blogger at the website Bankers Anonymous, who dug up information about the foreclosure and wrote about it Friday.
Several board members have blamed Isquierdo’s imploding candidacy on PROACT, the Illinois-based search firm that recruited Isquierdo. The company did not return calls seeking comment. Trustees will discuss the district’s contract with the firm Monday.
“The next thing we need to discuss is that we are going to fire PROACT,” trustee Adela Segovia said. “I frankly think that they need to go.”
Isquierdo and the members of the Sunnyside Board were attending the National School Boards Association (NSBA) conference in San Diego and were not be available for comment.
The NSBA conference is well known as an opportunity for school board members and administrators to spend extravagantly on relaxation while learning about the latest educational gadget and gimmick.
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