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This month, an investigation by WW into allegations of sexual assault and harassment cost Charles McGee his job running the social services nonprofit he founded, the Black Parent Initiative, as well as his candidacy for a Multnomah County Commission seat.
While the results of the investigation shocked many of McGee's supporters, it's now clear that for the past two years, his nonprofit existed in a state of chaos, much of it rooted in McGee's personal conduct.
For nine months last year, for example, the BPI operated without a board of directors, in violation of state law.
Yet neither Portland Public Schools, Multnomah County nor the Oregon Department of Education—the three government agencies that funded half of the nonprofit's $1.1 million annual budget—seemed to notice. Even now that they have become aware, none of them has taken action. The county and PPS continue to fund the BPI today. ODE has agreed upon but not yet started a new contract.
The situation raises questions about government agencies' scrutiny of the contractors they pay to provide services to some of Portland's most vulnerable citizens.
The BPI's three big funders last year were the county ($100,000), the education department ($175,000) and the school district (about $200,000).
The agencies hired the nonprofit to do outreach to black parents and to help them and their families with literacy, parenting skills, job searches and finding housing.
When the BPI signed those contracts, the nonprofit agreed to adhere to "all federal, state and local laws." One of the most basic Oregon laws governing both for-profits and nonprofits is that "each corporation shall have a board of directors."
As the Portland Tribune reported last week, the initiative's board resigned en masse in December 2016—following an allegation of sexual harassment against McGee by a BPI employee—and the organization did not reconstitute its board for nine months. (This allegation is separate from the alleged sexual assault by McGee that WW reported Feb. 7.)
The resignations matter because a board's primary responsibility is to safeguard an organization's legal and financial health, in part by supervising its top executive.
Beatrice Dohrn, director of the Nonprofit Clinic at the University of Oregon School of Law, says without a board, a nonprofit technically doesn't exist.
"The organization isn't empowered to do anything without a board," Dohrn says. "The board is the organization."
Dohrn says it is "extremely uncommon" for an entire board to resign. What the board members should have done, she says, was exercise their authority.
"It's a stunning failure," Dohrn says. "The board shouldn't have resigned; the board should have fired [McGee]."
Portland Public Schools says it didn't know at the time that the BPI's board had quit—and now that it does, the district's response is that it's focused on services provided by BPI front-line staff, not the nonprofit's governance.
"PPS was not aware," says district spokeswoman Amber Shoebridge. "It is not part of our contract expectations or monitoring process."
Multnomah County also says it didn't know until last week that the BPI had operated without the required supervision. "Multnomah County was not aware that BPI did not have a board of directors for nine months," says county spokeswoman Julie Sullivan-Springhetti. "This is a concern, and the county will be taking steps to ensure that public funds are being spent appropriately."
She says the county would not normally check to see if a nonprofit's board is operational.
"Only contracts with federal funds," she says, "are required to have onsite reviews where we would have obtained information regarding an absent board."
The Oregon Department of Education was also unaware the BPI's board had quit. The agency's two-year contract with the organization ended last June, but ODE recently agreed to its two-year, $200,000 contract.
"The ODE was not aware that BPI was without a board of directors for nine months," says agency spokeswoman Tricia Yates. "ODE is current seeking advice through the Department of Justice to determine how best to proceed in relation to the time period in which the nonprofit was without a board." Yates says her agency is also seeking DOJ's advice on how to proceed with a pending contract with the BPI.
Another practice that might have alarmed the initiative's funders, had they noticed: The person handling human resources for the BPI for the past two years was McGee's wife, Serilda Summers-McGee, who also worked for one of the nonprofit's biggest funders.
Summers-McGee confirmed to WW that from January 2015 through January 2017, she provided the initiative with a variety of HR consulting services. She did some work for free and was paid for other work.
During much of that time, Summers-McGee also served as the full-time director of human resources for the Oregon Department of Education. She says she played no role, however, in getting the nonprofit awarded a two-year, $350,000 contract from that agency. (ODE confirms this.)
And although she served as an HR consultant to the Black Parent Initiative, Summers-McGee, who is now director of human resources for the city of Portland, also says she was unaware of the 2015 harassment allegation against her husband that led the board to resign.
"I had no involvement with that complaint at all," she says.
Some experts think it is a bad idea for a spouse to provide HR consulting services to the organization her husband runs because her loyalties to her spouse and the organization's well-being could be at odds.
Dohrn says there are circumstances in which a nonprofit's leader or staff might want to hire a family member. But she says that decision is not the executive's call to make—best practices would be for the board to hold a recorded vote on any such appointment. That didn't happen, apparently.
A spokeswoman for the BPI board says the current board was unaware that Summers-McGee provided professional services to the nonprofit.
"Neither the current board nor counsel knew before you asked that Serilda's firm had been retained," says BPI spokeswoman Kerry McClenahan. "Nor do they know what the scope of services was that she provided."
Although the BPI's funders have shrugged off news about the organization, its new board has taken action.
The board fired McGee on Feb. 14, following its discovery that he had covered up a female staff member's 2015 allegation of sexual harassment against him.
That discovery came after a WW story about allegations McGee and another man, Portland banking executive Aubré Dickson, sexually assaulted a woman in 2012 ("No Way Out," WW, Feb. 7, 2018). Neither man could be reached for comment for this story.
A criminal investigation by the Portland Police Bureau into the sexual assault allegations continues.