Official used EOB kitchen for business

Thursday, April 8, 2004 | 11:11 a.m.

Claude Logan, the chairman of the board of directors of the troubled Economic Opportunity Board, used a kitchen built for a publicly funded early childhood program for his private business, to provide meals to prisoners.

Under the arrangement, Logan rented out the kitchen during nine months ending June 2003, said state Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas, an EOB board member and the appointed spokesman for the agency.

Logan, whose company Institutional Food Services Management fed about 2,700 Clark County inmates daily in 2003 as part of a $3.8 million contract, needed to find a new kitchen temporarily because the kitchen he normally used was under renovation, according to Capt. Mikel Holt, of the detention services division at Clark County Detention Center.

Because federal funds support the program, officials in Las Vegas investigating the agency this week are now looking into the arrangement, said Windy Hill, associate commissioner for the Head Start bureau in Washington, who is leading the team.

Hill said the arrangement "would suggest a level of fraud."

"If it's true it's criminal," Hill said. "Congress did not appropriate Head Start funds for any purpose other than to support Head Start services."

Logan did not return several calls seeking comment.

Neal said the board of directors approved the arrangement in a Sept. 25, 2002, meeting because Logan "needed something to prepare food and he paid for the services."

Neal said "nothing was addressed in the meeting about the federal policies affecting this contract -- we were told by Marcia Rose Walker (former EOB executive director, who resigned in February) that it was on the up and up."

Walker could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Hill said addressing the issue would be beyond the scope of her team's inquiry, but that her team would gather information about it. This week's investigation is a follow-up visit to the program's 2003 triennial review -- the sort of follow-up seen in less than 10 percent of Head Start programs nationwide, Hill said.

The federal team came to Las Vegas after several questions about EOB were raised. Another group of federal officials is investigating the child care assistance program, which can't account for $2.1 million in state and federal funds.

The EOB, an anti-poverty program that started in the 1960s, and oversees job training, child care and alcohol and drug abuse programs, has been beset by problems recently.

The agency, which has had an annual budget as high as $60 million, has been in turmoil this year after the chief financial officer was fired and the executive director resigned. Several key employees have since left and two board members resigned.

When told of Logan's kitchen arrangement, Hill said it "is beyond me."

"We're moving into (possible) criminal misconduct here and the extent of our authority is to move information to appropriate sources," he said.

Such an investigation would likely be handled by the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services, the agency that oversees Head Start nationwide, she said.

The EOB's by-laws say that a "breach of ... fiduciary duty" by a board member includes "use of EOB resources, programs, staff, equipments, or influence by a Board member for that Board member's own personal gain, profit, or advantage."

The by-laws go on to say that the board may remove any of its members by a majority plus two vote for such conduct.

Neal said the arrangement did not constitute a breach of fiduciary duty because "there was no private gain to Mr. Logan -- there was a gain to EOB," referring to the $27,000 Logan paid the agency during the life of the contract. He declined to comment on the $3.8 million contract Logan has with the county.

The nine-month arrangement between Logan and the EOB also brought a change in schedule for the Head Start program's kitchen crew, which meant that hot meals were delivered to early childhood centers across the Las Vegas Valley up to two hours earlier than normal, causing a drop in quality and numerous complaints from center staff, according to Michael Keavin, a former cook for Head Start.

Logan's company had a permit from the Clark County Health District to operate out of the Head Start kitchen at 3395 Pinks Place from Sept. 6, 2002 to June 26, 2003, according to Mark Gillespie, senior environmental health inspector for the district.

The company contracts with Clark County Detention Center to feed its inmates, Holt said. During the nine-month period, the kitchen at the detention center's north tower was under renovation, so Logan had to find another one, he said. Most of the actual renovation was done from February to July 2003, owing to project delays, he said.

Keavin, who worked for the Head Start kitchen from September 2001 to March 2003, said he remembers the Logan company arrangement well because of the problems it caused for the Head Start centers and for him and his colleagues.

He said the crew of 10 or so that handled the Head Start meals had to begin their shift at 4 a.m. and end at 12:30, or at least one and a half hours earlier than they normally would.

A result of the change in schedule was that they were forced to deliver food to the Head Start Centers earlier than they normally would, and the food sat in the centers for up to two hours before it was served.

"Casino buffets won't let food sit for more than 40 minutes," Keavin said. "Several times, by the time lunch rolled around, the food was inedible ... and teachers made formal complaints to the kitchen."

But Neal said he thought the crew only had to move its shift back an hour, and hadn't heard that the quality of the food was affected.

Keavin also said the Head Start crew "had to move a lot of stuff around" in the refrigerators and freezers to accommodate Logan's crew, and that equipment such as sheet pans and chafing dishes turned up missing during the period the other crew was working in the kitchen.

Janice Rogers, quality assurance coordinator for the Head Start program, Diana Goff, administrator of the program, and Diba Hadi, who directs the family development division that oversees the program, all refused to comment on the Logan contract and its impact on the Head Start crew.

To Keavin, the whole situation -- including complaints that were made about the Logan contract -- was an example of how he saw affairs handled at the agency.

"If anybody said anything, it was swept under the rug," he said.

Neal dismissed the issue.

"The next time, you should talk to me and not some cook," he said.