City of Sunny Isles Beach Official Website
By Fabiola Stuyvesant, Commissioner
(Monday, December 4, 2023) – The PTSA is a membership-driven association. Local units are part of the National PTA which represents parents’ and students’ interests, rights, and “values”. The bigger the membership the greater the impact they can have on INFLUENCING LEGISLATION at all levels (county, state, and federal). Another interesting fact is that ALL executive board meetings are CONFIDENTIAL. Members are forced to sign some type of non-disclosure agreement to become part of the executive board.
Post-COVID, and after many non-residents of SIB got elected to the SIB PTSA board, the organization became highly dysfunctional: lacking student/community events it was better known for, involving in financial irregularities, and mandating meetings confidentiality hence limiting transparency especially in budget matters.
Questionable spending included wasting over $5,000 on an Orlando trip during the summer (one of $1,500 trip recipient does not even have children attending our school), the UNAUTHORIZED purchase of $21,600 worth of towels in June 2023, and MORE. The authorities had been made aware of the matter. However, efforts to address these issues with the National, State, and County PTSA were met with minimal to no-action. Their response, essentially suggesting “what is done is done,” overlooked the need for accountability and unfairly put the NEWLY elected, uninvolved board on a “pause” instead of holding the real bad actors responsible.
But on a brighter note, I will continue demanding answers for the damage done to our community and I’m glad to share that a group of parents are organizing themselves without any other purpose than to serve our students, teachers, and community thus from the parents of SIB a new organization is being born.
Contact Commissioner Fabiola Stuyvesant at seat3@sibfl.net or 305.792.1751.
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