A controversy has developed over what officials with the Apple Valley Unified School District and the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools’ division of business advisory services has acknowledged was the repeated transfer of substantial amounts of money in what are otherwise the Apple Valley district’s sequestered accounts for funds earmarked for specific purposes.
In a recent opinion piece by a member of the Apple Valley Unified School District’s Board of Trustees, Renee Longshore, published by the Victorville-based Victor Valley Daily Press, note was made that the district in some of its financial documentation provided to her, other members of the board and the public, there was a discrepancy between what shown as deficit spending and decreases in the district’s reserves.
Additionally, in the opinion piece, which appeared in the paper on January 22, Longshore noted that district revenue had grown by 57 percent between fiscal year 2018/19 and 2024/25 but that the district had also seen a 39 percent increase in teacher and pupil support staff salaries and a 45 percent increase in what the district pays for books and supplies. She expressed concern that over the same six year period, the district had sustained a 90 percent increase in the cost of employing supervisors and administrators.
Reserves are the accumulative amount of money an entity such as a school district accrues as a consequence of spending less money in a budget cycle than it receives in revenue during the same budget cycle. While those reserves can be built up over the years as an entity such as a school district receives revenue in excess of its costs, in those years where the revenue diminishes or remains the same while operational costs increase above the amount of money coming in, deficit spending occurs. Deficit spending eats into a district’s reserves.
Longshore, in the piece appearing in the Daily Press, said the documentation provided to her and the other board members showed “reserves have decreased at a higher rate than the reported deficit spending: $2,474,673.34 in the 18/19 calendar year, $1,308,535.72 in 19/20, $2,633,546.27 in 20/21, $3,524,903.99 in 21/22, $2,467,852.44 in 22/23, $3,049,644.15 in 23/24, and $98,500.18 in 24/25. In fact, over the past seven years, funds were off $15,459,155.91.”
According to Longshore, who came into office in December 2024 after first being elected in November 2024, there is a mystery as to “where this money went.” She asked, [W]hat happened to $15,459,155.91, and how long has this gone on?”
Longshore indicated her belief and/or perception that the quality of education in the district was being diminished while district employees, in particular those who are higher up, are making more money. Without saying so directly, she implied that the district’s priorities were askew.
Despite past salary increases, Longshore said, teachers are asking for more money, even as revenue to the district is flattening out.
“As AVUSD navigates impasse with certificated staff, school sites have been asked to consider cuts,” she wrote in the piece that the Daily Press published. “Unfortunately, classroom spending these past few years has already gone down. The AVUSD School Board has not been clearly informed, according to the Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team’s (FCMAT, an outside auditor) report presented at a Special Meeting/Workshop of the board of trustees on October 30, 2025. This has not changed.”
The Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team is an independent state agency in California that has been in existence for 35 years that provides fiscal advice and management assistance to school districts.
Longshore wrote, “Even now, we continue to approve an over-projection of expenditures, while allowing the shuffle of excess funds, unbridled, into accounts, unspent.”
In one way or another, Longshore’s opinion piece hit a nerve. It appears that district officials contacted the office of Ted Alejandre, the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools to see if he or someone from his office could offer an explanation that might assuage those who assigned credibility to what Longshore had written.
Alejandre handed the request off to his offices chief business officer, Richard De Nava, who in turn brought in his underling, Thomas Cassida, the county superintendent of schools director of business advisor services.
Casssida generated a letter dated February 3, 2026 to Trenae Nelson, the pple Valley Unified School District superintendent. The letter gve a rather dry review of the budget review process that the county superintendent of schools office does of school district budgets and their budgetary process. Included with the letter was an attachment, the provenance of which was somewhat inexact.
The attachment referenced several transfers out to the district’s “special reserve fund, also referred to as “Fund 40.”
These consisted of $2,474,673.34 in total transfers out to the “Cafeteria Fund,” also referred to as Fund 13, followed by $2,474,673.34 in transfers in to the “Cafeteria Fund; another $1,308,536.32 transferred out to the “Cafeteria Fund and another $1,308,536.32 transferred in to the Cafeteria Fund; $2,633,546.27 transferred out of the Cafeteria Fund and then $2,633,546.27 transferred into the Cafeteria Fund; $3,508,094.54 transferred from the district’s Deferred Maintenance (Fund 14), which was replaced by $3,508,094.54 transferred back into the Deferred Maintenance Fund; $600,000 transferred out of the Deferred Maintenance Fund and then $600,000 transferred into the Deferred Maintenance Fund; $149,133.34 transferred out of the district’s Adult Ed Fund (Fund 11), followed by $149,133.34 transferred into the Adult Ed Fund; another $352,319.84 transferred out of the Adult Ed Fund, only to have $352,319.84 transferred back into the Adult Ed Fund; $2,101,659.18 transferred out of the Special Reserve Fund and then $2,101,659.18 transferred in to the Special Reserve Fund; and $5,495.00 transferred out of the Cafeteria Fund and $5,495.00 in to the Cafeteria Fund. The documentation also shows $2,000,000 of what is labeled “Other Authorized Transfers” in to Fund 01 and $2,000,000 in transfers out from Fund 14 to Fund 01.
The document offers this “Conclusion,” stating, “The $15.4 million identified as ‘missing’ is actually the total of documented funds moved appropriately between various district funds over seven years. While these amounts decrease the general fund in the listed amounts, they increase the balances of other funds, including Fund 11-Adult Education, Fund 13-Cafeteria Fund, Fund 14-Deferred Maintenance, and Fund 40-Special Reserve Fund. When the financial statements are viewed in their entirety—including interfund transfers and audit adjustments—every dollar cited is fully accounted for and reconciled to zero.”
Left unexplained by the document is the dates when the transfers were made and why the funds were transferred.
The district and the superintendent of county schools office also acknowledge that the state’s Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team was involved in examining the transfers and the activity around the transfers.
The Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team does involve itself in districts where and when there is no active fiscal crisis on occasion. The team is most often availed of to handle emergency interventions, but does also provide proactive management assistance, studies, and training to help districts improve financial practices, operational efficiency, and prevent future distress. Those proactive services extend to school districts, county offices of education, and charter schools, which can request Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team take part in studies or technical assistance to improve management practices, policies, or organizational structure before a crisis occurs. The Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team offers professional development for districts’ and county superintendents’ chief business officials and other staff. It also provides free, voluntary tools for prevention like its so-called Special Education Efficiency Tool and Projection-Pro software to help districts monitor their financial health. District can also invite the team to review departments or processes to avoid potential future issues.
Nevertheless, that the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team was asked to intervene at the Apple Valley Unified School District is an indication that things had evolved or deteriorated to a point where some level of assistance was needed.
Both Cassida’s letter and its attachment, which appeared to have been generated by some unspecified individual or individuals with the Apple Valley Unified School District, revealed the sensitive nature of what Longshore was alluding to in her opinion piece published by the Daily Press. Longshore made no references to embezzlement or misappropriation of funds but rather to prioritizations in district spending that gave short shrift to education programs while administrative salaries advanced.
The district statement document asserted that documents distributed by some person unknown at the school board’s meetings that laid out the quantified district deficits was not providing the totality of information available.
“It appears that throughout the years in question, the author of these documents was omitting and/or incorrectly accounting for portions of the financial statements regarding interfund transfers in and out, audit adjustments, and other restatements,” the unattributed district statement says. “It is important to account for these items as they directly impact the fund balance (reserves) and are accounted for separately on the financial statements from revenue and expenditures. It can be compared to moving funds from one bank account to another within a household. The money has not disappeared, but rather it has moved into another account or, in our case, fund.”
Cassida’s letter concludes, “The county’s fiscal oversight process, supported by the district’s FCMAT Report and the last three annual audit reports, have not exposed any instances of misappropriation of district funds.”