Fraud in the Hampton Bays School District

Dear Neighbors,

I would like to bring to your attention financial fraud that has been uncovered in the Hampton Bays school district. As a taxpayer, I'm appalled that this has gone ignored by the Hampton Bays School District for this long. According to my resources, Lawrence Luce, the Assistant Superintendent for Finance and Operations, has turned a blind eye and has had knowledge of said fraud. While our Director of Facilities, Tom McElrath, has been enabling this fraud to continue. One of the district's custodians, Samuel France, is stealing from the taxpayers of both Hampton Bays and East Hampton. Unfortunately it appears the fraud doesn't end with him.

Upon receipt of Mr Samuel's timesheets, which were obtained from a foil request, a spreadsheet analysis was completed. The spreadsheet clearly shows that Mr France has been a full-time employee with both Hampton Bays School District and East Hampton School District simultaneously. Timesheets show he is working 22 hour days with several instances of time overlapping between both positions. In addition, he's been paid overtime under Hampton Bays while working for East Hampton. For example, between 12/2/2023-12/15/2023 he was paid 34.5 hours of overtime by the Hampton Bays district while he was also clocked-in for the East Hampton district! Furthermore, witnesses have seen Mr France sleeping in the school for the past three years!

So this begs the question, what were Mr France's qualifications to be head custodian? Did Tom McElrath ever perform a background check on him before promoting him to head custodian? Were his references and qualifications verified before he was hired? Where are the checks and balances? There is clearly a loophole in the system that is being exploited. And again, why is he being permitted to live at the high school?

Who is Lawrence Luce protecting and why hasn't anyone in the District taken legal action against Samuel France?

The Board Members of both Hampton Bays and East Hampton School Districts have been notified.

Will this egregious matter be swept under the rug or will the Board finally put an end to the corruption?