Ex-aide: Education funds used for LULAC activities

In addition to the personal security that Island Security provided to former Education Secretary Victor Fajardo, public funds also paid for security services at activities for the League of United Latin American Citizens, according to an Education Department employee.

Carmen Ortega, a social worker for the department, testified for a second day Wednesday before the Senate Education and Culture Committee, which is looking into whether public funds were funneled to LULAC, a non-profit organization, to lobby for statehood under the Rosello administration. Ortega was an assistant to Elsie Valdes, the former director of Education's Drug and Weapons Free School Zone and former LULAC president.

Ortega said she handled matters pertaining to both LULAC and ZELDA, as the school program was known, between 1996 and 1999. She presented before the committee invoices on Island Security for services rendered to LULAC and paid for with public funds.

According to Ortega, Valdes would contract the security agency for LULAC and would receive invoices on ZELDA's behalf.

The invoices Ortega presented showed the security firm was used during a 1999 LULAC Christmas party in the San Juan port area, and also for a 1998 activity in Tortugueros Recreational Area in Vega Baja.

Valdes is the main witness in the Special Independent Prosecutor's case against Fajardo for his alleged use of $220,000 from ZELDA's funds for his personal security.

Valdes has indicated that she only revised Island Security's invoices and authorized its payments, but was unaware that anything illegal was going on. The funds to pay for LULAC's activities and the security services were taken from a ZELDA special services fund.

The social worker added that Valdes forced her employees in the ZELDA program to belong to the non-profit organization and to actively participate in it. Work done after regular hours were paid as overtime, she said.

Ortega also told senators that all airfare tickets for employees planning to participate in LULAC activities off the island were dealt with through ZELDA. She added that the tickets were sometimes distributed in New Progressive Party headquarters.

Ortega said the tickets were paid for with checks written from contractors with the Education Department. ZELDA contractors were often asked for their credit card numbers to pay for delegates' airline tickets to national conventions, she added.

Almost 2,000 people attended the 1997 convention in California, and nearly 3,000 went to next year's convention in Texas.

LULAC National President Rick Dovalina has insisted that he does not favor statehood for the island, and his organization has never lobbied for that status.

Ortega said her former boss implied she had direct contact with La Fortaleza, and former Gov. Pedro Rosello, and Valdes had said there was a direct line in the office to the governor which only she could answer.

"Ortega said the tickets were paid for with checks written from contractors with the Education Department. ZELDA contractors were often asked for their credit card numbers to pay for delegates' airline tickets to national conventions, she added."

If this is true, this is quite the scam and once again it's the U.S. Taxpayers that are getting hosed.

The corrupt politicians of Puerto Rico lobby the pandering politicians of the U.S. for more than a billion dollars for education.

Then the head of the Puerto Rico Dept. of Education conspires with contractors to allow them to over-charge the U.S. Taxpayers for their services.

And then they spend the extra funds in support of LULAC and who in the world knows what else.

I wonder if a U.S. politician taught them this one, or if they thought this scam up all by themselves?

Hey, guess where LULAC might have received the money to send 2,000 attendees to their '97 national convention in California and 3,000 to the '98 national convention in Texas?

Give up?

Why from the U.S. Taxpayers, via the Puerto Rico Department of Education, of course.

I know, I know, alot of you won't think that was an appropriate use for our Tax Dollars? But hey, technically they weren't ours anymore after they had been recycled through Puerto Rico Department of Education contractors.

Right? That does make what they did legal doesn't it? We can't blame them for not knowing we'd be upset about it. Right?

We will excuse them, because they are a different culture and everything. Right? Seriously, now. C'mon, no hard feelings. We have more money than we know what to do with. Don't we?

LOL!

"Let's get Mexico off our backs first and then go after these guys."

I'm not sure it's possible to deal with Puerto Rico and Mexico one-at-a-time.

Whose example do you think Mexico is following in it's approach to the rip-off of the American Taxpayers? Whose help have they enlisted? The corrupt in Puerto Rico are showing the equally corrupt in Mexico how to lobby our pandering politicians for so many BILLIONS, each year, that it's impossible to track it all.

Less than 4 million people living on a rock in the caribbean, roughly the size of the Chicagoland area, are receiving more BILLIONS than most actual states.

Puerto Rico receives American citizenship, American military protection, income and jobs from 17 military facilities, a VA Hospital, Federal Courts, EPA money, Dept. of Highways and Transportation money, FEMA and IRS jobs, U.S. Marshalls, DEA, National Parks, FBI, Customs, INS, Border Patrol, USDA, U.S. Postal Service, Federal Reserve Insurance, Social Security, Medicare, Food Stamps, Federal Student Loans and Grants, etc. all FOR FREE.

Now, they're illegally funneling our tax dollars to LULAC in support of open borders and unlimited immigration to the United States from the 3rd world and who knows what else.

The Bush family has been scrounging campaign contributions in Puerto Rico for the last 20 years, which are nothing but our recycled tax dollars that have been gifted to the ingrates in Puerto Rico. Jeb Bush picked up $150,000 the last time he was there.

Don't look to the Bush family to stop the give-away of Vieques or any of the rest of these goodies to Puerto Rico.

Mexico sees this stuff and says, "Why not us, too?" If we let Puerto Rico have all of this for nothing, why not every other country in the caribbean, central and south america and Mexico?

Puerto Rico needs to be straightened out, if not before then simultaneously along with Mexico.

IMO, what our pandering politicians allowed to happen first in Puerto Rico caused the rest of this mess we're in now.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.