Porn-Spending Official Got Sympathy When Questions Surfaced: Records

SUMMIT, IL – The then-superintendent of Argo Community High School got sympathy and only a few questions when his credit card spending came up behind closed doors last year.

Through the school, Patch obtained the recording of the school board's closed meeting last September.

At the time, the school was getting anonymous Freedom of Information Act requests for Superintendent William Toulios' credit card spending.

Last month, the board struck a deal for Toulios to leave after a months-long investigation by law and accounting firms into his spending, which was for porn and Viagra, among other things. State police said they are investigating.

In the closed meeting, Toulios' subordinate, Assistant Superintendent of Finance Joe Rojek, presented his report on the credit card spending.

Rojek, who was hired while Toulios was superintendent, reported that his boss had overspent his $6,000-a-year auto allowance by $494 and underspent his $6,000-a-year dress allowance by $1,269.

He said Toulios reimbursed the school for $427 in credit card charges for Slushy items. It was apparently unknown at the time, but those items were for porn, according to the later investigation.

Rojek's report was a far cry from the later inquiry, which indicated about $35,000 in questionable spending.

In his written report, Rojek said the school was tightening up its credit card procedures and that one of his employees was doing a "marvelous" job in vetting receipts. (The investigation found that Rojek weakened controls when he took the reins in 2022.)

During the closed meeting, Toulios' practice of giving gift cards came up.

Toulios, who took the helm in 2020, defended the spending.

"There are a lot of things that I'm very philanthropic about," he said. "For someone to say certain things is kind of hurtful."

A board member asked whether the philanthropy was from the school or Toulios personally.

"It's Argo," Toulios said, adding that such spending comes from the school's "community relations" budget."

At least one part of Rojek's report now appears to be incorrect.

Five items with Amazon Marketplace totaling more than $900 were listed as "MISC-Claudia." That referred to Toulios' secretary, Claudia Gonzalez.

One of those items was for $172.50. That was the same price as the Epoch line items on the credit card bills. The investigation found that those items were for porn, though Toulios maintained they were for The Epoch Times, a conservative publication.

In an email to Patch this week, interim Superintendent Brandon Cotter said Toulios, not Gonzalez, spent the $90. He pointed to the investigation report, which said Toulios had refused to provide the Amazon receipts.

In her own statement, Gonzalez confirmed Toulios was responsible for the five items in Rojek's report.

During the closed meeting, Toulios lamented the public records requests for his spending.

"The thing I've come to realize is people want to focus on what they want to focus on, whether it's negative or not. We can't control it," he said.

Greg Dietz, director of human resources, was understanding.

"Unfortunately, we live in a cancel culture," he said. "So when you do something that another person or other people do not like, even when you do it for all the right reasons, you become victim to cancel culture."

Dietz also expressed frustration that public records requesters can "hide behind" anonymous email accounts. (Pam Young, the principal's secretary, later publicly acknowledged she filed requests.)

In 2021, a year after Toulios became superintendent, Dietz was hired as a part-time Argo human resources official, now making $105,000 a year and allowed to work remotely. That's in addition to Nicole Wasko, who started in July as assistant superintendent of human resources, making $190,000.

At the meeting, Dan Kozal, the board's then-president, said the school may get requests from the same person for the same information.

"If we get another one, I'm going to tell them basically this is harassment," Kozal said. "I'll turn around and talk to James."

He was referring to the attorney, James Petrungaro of the Franczek law firm.

As it happened, the requests continued to come, and Patch wrote a story in January. The board put Toulios on leave in April.

Rojek, the finance official, has declined to comment.