Sneed & McGregor were apparently business partners, too | Hour 3

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links become a patron, go to the Pete calendar show.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support. All right. So I started this, uh, this story, uh, In the last hour, but I'm going to, but I did not, I didn't get to all of the details, so I'm going to reset. This is a reset here, okay? Much like Hillary Clinton's famous red button that she gave to the Russians. The headline at the Charlotte, sorry, the Charlotte Ledger, business pitch reveals deeper ties between Sneed and consultant. Sneed is Stephanie Sneed, who was the school board chair, the Charlotte Mecklenburg board of education chair until last Tuesday when she stepped down as chair. She is still a board member, but she is no longer the chair. The consultant is Racky McGregor. Uh, Racky McGregor's wife, uh, runs a company called Sid Kimmel. S Y D K Y M Y L or something like that. Um, yeah, that's it. And, They, that company had contracts with CMS for social and emotional learning or SEL. Racky McGregor, a former CMS consultant slash employee cabinet member for the superintendent. He had this job as an executive in residence, which I don't really, I don't know what that is. Not sure how that position was created. but he was seen as an ally of Stephanie Sneed, the chair. But apparently, according to the Charlotte Ledger, they were a bit more than just political allies and friends. They were business partners to some extent here. As the Ledger reports, a piece by Michelle Crouch and Tony Messia, documents obtained by the Charlotte Ledger show that Racky McGregor was Sneed's business partner on at least one consulting pitch. Okay, so they made a proposal to the Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office. In April. Okay? In April, Stephanie Sneed and Racky McGregor apparently presented a proposal to the Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office in an attempt to win a consulting contract. This is according to an email that was sent on Thursday to the county manager, Michael Bryant. That email to the county manager came from the sheriff's office's director of business operations. So reading between the lines here, trying to piece together this puzzle, it appears that after everything blew up on Tuesday at the board of education and the You had the superintendent's memo that came out and people started asking all these questions about contracts that the chair was trying to do outside of the knowledge and purview of the board and the superintendent in order to apparently funnel money to Racky McGregor through the consulting contracts and an outside law firm. It appears that the county and the different agencies that are funded by the county, They may have started looking back through their own records to see, hey, do we have any vulnerabilities? Do we have any points here where we were, you know, these access points where we were having dealings with Racky McGregor, his consulting firm, his wife's consulting firm, or Stephanie Sneed and her nonprofit or consulting firm? Because she has one too, which I tracked down last week. but it did not appear to be operational. I mentioned this last week. I'm not really sure what it is that they're, it was like step forward or something like that is what she called it. So it looks like people in these agencies are now going back through and trying to figure out, do we have any exposure? Because with the state Bureau of investigations looking into this and the contracts, the auditor's office looking into this, These different agencies and the people involved, now they may be exposed if they had any dealings with these people, right? Also, keep in mind, as I mentioned last hour, that the superintendent, while the school board is in closed session last Tuesday, deciding to fire her, basically, she is sending an email to the county manager, Michael Bryant, giving him a heads up, hey, the money that was used for these contracts at the Board of Ed, those are county dollars. These are local dollars. Just want to make you aware, like, this is stuff that you guys funded. So I wonder now, did the county manager tell all of the agencies, hey, everybody, go through and find out, do you have any exposure? Is there any, are there any contracts that you guys have been doing with the same people and their entities? So apparently the Charlotte Ledger got a hold of a slide deck presentation, a slideshow. And in this presentation, it lists Stephanie Sneed, Racky McGregor, along with Racky McGregor's wife, and former Charlotte Mecklenburg police chief, Johnny Jennings as part of this team. And they were pitching a one year organizational transformation proposal. So a, a, a reform proposal for the sheriff's office, which the sheriff's office declined because obviously the sheriff's office is running a Like a well-oiled machine, people. I mean, there's no problems going on over at the sheriff's office. Why would Sheriff McFadden think that he needed any kind of outside consultancy to help him improve or transform his organization? He doesn't need that. He's running a perfect organization. My goodness. They were pitching him this proposal at a cost of $ 400, 000. The sheriff's office turned it down. The Ledger reports, quote, the page of the presentation devoted to McGregor lists him as affiliated with QONECT, L-L-C, Q-O-N-N-E-C-T, which I'm not really sure why you would hire a consulting firm that does not know how to spell connect. But the presentation's final page lists QONECT as the contact for the proposal. That's Rocky McGregor's organization. That's his that's his company. That's the same company that a month earlier had signed a $ 30, 000 a month contract with the Raleigh law firm Pointer Spruill for its work with CMS on an affordable housing initiative for teachers. This is the one that has been the focus of all the attention is this contract through Pointer Spruill that then funneled $ 30, 000 a month to Racky McGregor. And apparently that was negotiated and or entered into by the school board chair, Stephanie Sneed. And school board members say they were not aware of this. There are people inside the superintendent's administration that also claim they were not aware of this. Superintendent said she wasn't aware of the terms of this thing. How did this happen? The pitch to the sheriff's office is significant. Because it shows that Stephanie Sneed and Racky McGregor were working together in a business capacity, though the extent and details of their financial relationship are unclear. CMS records show Sneed played a central role in hiring Pointer Spruill, the law firm, and in the arrangement that led to that firm hiring Racky McGregor's company, Quinette. though publicly available records do not show how the firm settled on bringing him aboard as a subcontractor whose fees were paid by CMS. That is still unclear. We don't know this. Now, the SBI has the power to find that out, as does the auditor. And I suspect we will. How did that contract get negotiated? Right? And this is what prompted the messaging from the CMS staff to the board chair Snead saying, yo, what's the deal with this? Where did this come from? And she was like, just cut the check. Yeah, no, that's not how that's supposed to work. And she should know that as a lawyer, an employment and labor lawyer, formerly for the DOD, Department of Defense. The holidays will be here before you know it, and so now is the time to create precious and priceless family heirlooms that will last for generations. 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And they will tell others to come who you are. Visit createavideo.com. All right, let me jump over to the text line. Danny says. Do you think that the former mayor saw this coming down the pike and got out before it all hit the fan? Her fingerprints may be on it somewhere. I do not. I've seen no evidence that former mayor Vi Lyles has any role in any of this whatsoever. In fact, for the better part of like 40 years, there's always been this general agreement, I don't want to say gentleman's agreement, but There's I don't even I can't say unspoken because it kind of is spoken every now and again. But there is this this agreement that like the city of Charlotte is not going to get involved with CMS stuff like that's your jurisdiction. And we're not going to weigh in on various scandals and various things that happens just like that's you guys. You know, that's the way it was told to me 25 years ago, 20 years ago. that they all keep a separation. So I would be very, very surprised if the former mayor had any knowledge or involvement in any of this. And a lot of this stuff seems to have occurred within the last 10 months. That's what it looks like. Mike in Pineville believes that that the fives, that's the majority block of the five votes on the Board of Ed, the fives' arrogance will lead to sloppiness in emails and texts, and if the SBI is so inclined, they will find all kinds of evidence of corruption. A tale as old as time. Yeah, see, that's the thing. The SBI can go after all of your personal communications on stuff like this, not just your official. CMS email, you know. 704 number says if the state auditor finds that funds were misappropriated, do they face criminal charges? Well, the auditor cannot bring the charges themselves, the, the state auditor's office. Um, but they can and do work with the SBI and they will make referrals to the state Bureau of investigation. And then that would be on the SBI to bring those charges. Um, It shouldn't just be resigning jail, just like the rest of us would know. Yeah. I mean, and that's the thing, like, yes, if you find the evidence that you can then charge people with and you can convict them, then yeah, throw the book at them. Um, but, but that's, but we're not there yet. We don't, right. We're still in the investigative phase. So we have to have patience as investigations, uh, continue and you've got the SBI and you've got the auditor's office. And I think it's important to point out here that that's a good thing that you've got two different entities that are looking at this because they are there. That's going to keep them both accountable. Like I have more confidence in the auditor's office to root out the financial side of this stuff, and to then go public with their report, which would then pressure the SBI, which may or may not, but it may not want to bring the charges for political reasons, right? But because the auditor's looking at it also, that's going to be harder to avoid if they actually uncover the evidence necessary to bring charges. So it's a good thing. But again, we have to have patience. . Gasp. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Okay. Well, thank you for that. Um. Diane says if Snead is out there pitching contracts, how is she getting paid? Well, that's the thing. If you are a board of education member or Charlotte city council member or whatever, like these are part-time positions. And so, um, even though Charlotte city council pays themselves a full-time salary, but, um, These are, quote, part-time positions, citizen legislator positions. So you are allowed to have your own business. You're allowed to be employed doing something else and then doing the Board of Ed work on the side. That's your side hustle, right? So you are allowed to engage in business dealings and the like. However, this might be perceived as a bit of a conflict of interest. So therein lies the problem, is that The kind of work you are doing. Right. Our city councilman, Smudgy Mitchell, he ran into some of these problems, too. He had to step down off city council. Right. And then run again and win reelection. But still, like you're not allowed to engage in these kinds of things if it presents a conflict of interest. All right. Real quick. Every government number gets revised. Right. Every projection gets walked back. Gold does not file corrections like GovCo. Revelation Gold Group helps families hold physical gold and silver, including in a tax-advantaged gold IRA. It's real, it's in your name, and 10 minutes tells you if your retirement account qualifies. If you want to learn more, go to calendarmetals.com. That's calendarmetals.com. There is a link in the podcast description. Or if you want to talk to somebody, you can call 888-465-3049. All right, let me jump over to the text line again. I've got some more to get through, and I'll return to the Charlotte Ledger. And by the way, I try to point out when local reporters are doing good work, and the Charlotte Ledger is doing good work on this CMN corruption scandal, and that's what this is now, okay? This is a corruption scandal, okay? Okay. Um, and I know people are kind of hesitant at first to start using these terms, but, uh, I am not one of those people. We are, we are well down the path of corruption scandal territory. Okay. Uh, so good reporting by the ledger, Michelle Crouch, Tony Messiah, uh, with this latest, uh, what I would say, and I don't say this often, but this, this does, I think rank up in there with the, uh, explosive category of reports. Brian says. About the prosecutions being under the ultimate purview of baby Jesus, a.k.a. Jeff Jackson, the Attorney General. Not anymore. Not anymore, Brian. Uh-huh. The legislature took control of the SBI back in 2023. Uh-huh. That used to be the case for a long time. for like 40 years, the SBI was under the supervision of the attorney general as part of the DOJ. Then in 2014 through 2023, it got transferred to the department of public safety for administrative purposes. So it was kind of operating as an independent agency that would report directly to the governor. But then in December, 2023, the, The SBI left the Department of Public Safety and became an independent cabinet-level agency under the direction of the North Carolina General Assembly. Mm-hmm. So no baby Jesus involvement. Jeff with a G says, Pete, corruption, scandal, Democrats. Yeah, that tracks. Mm-hmm. Let me see here. Brian. Oh, sorry. Already read from Brian. Jennifer says, I don't see how Charlotte taxpayers can have any confidence in this board to pick a new superintendent. Correct. Correct. Yeah. I mean, like that is the arrogance and hubris of the fivers, the majority block. Like, you are staring in the face of a State Bureau of Investigation probe. You've got the auditor's office sniffing all around before last Tuesday. Right? You see this stuff coming. And you still fire the superintendent. Thereby bringing even more heat to yourselves. More. Focus more as they try to now distance themselves and say, oh, this is all just a distraction and we need a reset of leadership and all of this. Guys, you've just made it way worse. But in your arrogance and hubris, you think somehow or another like this is going to, what, inoculate you from this stuff? Like the damage was done. Damage was already done. Now it's just getting exposed and you're not going to be able to contain this. despite you hiring a PR crisis firm. Um, Gabby says, can CMS school board still hold meetings and run the schools while in jail? Uh, it would be zoom calls. Um, I think, and then you would get that recorded. You know, the following is a mess or you're, you're receiving a call from the Mecklenburg County detention center. So you would have that, recording playing over the, you know, over the meeting, but I think you could probably do it via zoom. Um, Yankee Steve says, seriously, can't wait for the level of corruption. They uncover Charlotte. Local politics is an absolute joke right now. Yeah. And this is, this is what I keep warning. The business community and the other local elected bodies are this is not a good look. This is how you kill your city. Now, maybe you don't care. Maybe you're going to get yours and then get out. Maybe that's the thinking. And maybe like, well, not maybe the people who are attracted to quote unquote public service, they generally tend to have a higher percentage of people who are on the dark triad, a personality spectrum there. Right? So the, they may think that they never get caught. That's why they have this kind of arrogance, this kind of narcissism, right? So, yeah, I mean, it's just, this is not good for the city of Charlotte. It's not good for the residents. It's not good because then you get business leaders that don't want to play in this sandbox. You know, why, if I'm a business owner and I'm looking to relocate or to stay in Charlotte, Do I want to swim in this, to mix my metaphors, swimming in sandboxes, but do I want to swim in this pond where I have to take into account some level of corruption? You know? Is it harder to attract candidates? Like, yeah. How are you going to attract a new superintendent to come to CMS? We're going to go, like, so the CMS board, they held a meeting to start up their, you know, search for a new superintendent. And you're going to hold public meetings about it. Yeah, good luck with that. What do you think those things are going to turn into? We're only asking for people to tell us what qualities they want in a superintendent. I got one quality. How about the willingness to sacrifice your job to whistleblow on corruption? I would like that. I would like that. Oh, and you know what? Apparently we had that with this past superintendent that you fired because. She started asking questions about these contracts. And you fired her for it. Who is going to take this job? All they do is run a search on Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools. These are the stories that pop up first in the Google machine. So what kind of a candidate wants to come into that situation? Not the good ones. Not the honest ones. The ones who think, yeah, I can play in that sandbox. That's who we're going to get. That's my fear is now you're going to have somebody that understands how that game is played. 704 number says, if the shenanigans going on at CMS are any indication of what's going on throughout the whole Department of Education, no wonder President Trump wants to shut it all down. I'm with him 100%. Yeah. Well, it's like Jordan Peterson said, unguarded stores of value will be set upon by parasites. If we, as citizens in a self-governing society, if we allow these stores of value, and this is multi-billion dollars in CMS, if you don't protect it, it will be ravaged by parasites that feed off of the bloat, off of the value. They will come in and they will destroy it. Dan says the greed, arrogance, and gall of these people on the board and in the community is shocking, but not unexpected. Yeah. As Jennifer said, it's a complete degradation of the confidence in the institution. You are destroying the thing that you purport to be trying to save or to preserve or to improve. You are destroying it. As one who wants to see the K-12 model blown up, Just so good, good work. I mean, like I couldn't have done this. You guys, you guys who were like defenders of this system, you're doing far more to undermine confidence in it than anything I could do. Good job. Back to the Charlotte ledger story. Stephanie Sneed and Racky McGregor have not commented publicly on the investigations and they did not return phone calls for this article. But at last week's school board meeting, Sneed chastised the public for appearing to pay more attention to the growing school board controversy than to what's going on inside CMS classrooms. She said the frenzy of the public is shameful. That's right. She's disappointed in us. Classic narcissist. Reverse victim and offender. That's what she's doing. It's part of the DARVO. D-A-R-V-O is a deny and then anger and then reverse victim offender. The 27-page presentation to the sheriff's office contained a half-dozen photos of Sheriff Gary, not my fault, McFadden. Which, that makes sense, by the way. If you're trying to win a contract with McFadden's office, it's probably a good idea to put lots of pictures of him in the presentation. Right? I mean, they put his picture on, like, all their press releases. Oh, well, all the happy ones. All the good stuff. They put his... And it takes up, I've talked about this, so I'm not going to go. In depth on this, but just it drives me nuts because I print everything and I got to print like a third of the page is wasted ink on a picture of him. You know, no other elected official I've ever seen does anything like this, but that's McFadden. So if you're going to win a contract or you're going to try to win a contract with his office, it does make sense that you'd plaster his photo everywhere in the presentation, right? So they described a sweeping plan, this is what they were pitching, to strengthen leadership, elevate public trust, optimize operations, improve program performance, stabilize the workforce, and deliver direct community impact. So you could see why this was rejected. because he's already doing all of those things. He doesn't need any improvement. What are you talking about? The proposal included leadership coaching. Well, take that off the board. He's coaching all of the leaders just perfectly. Just stop it. That's why they all quit. An operational audit, employee recruitment and retention training, and public relations work to build stronger public trust, credibility, and visibility. The group also proposed social-emotional programming for female inmates, a plan for reopening Detention Center North and the creation of a non-profit foundation. They asked for a 12-month commitment at $ 33, 000 a month, saying the work would pay for itself through efficiencies, decreased employee turnover, and improved program performance. The presentation slide for SNEAD describes her as, quote, an executive leader, attorney, and workforce and governance strategist. It says prominently that she's chair of the Board of Ed, Although the page lists her as Stephanie M. Sneed Esquire, it says she is an attorney and lists one of her areas of expertise as law. A search of the North Carolina State Bar membership directory does not show her license to practice in North Carolina. She is registered in New York. I talked about that last week. I went and did some research on her, and she was admitted to the bar, I think, in 2005. in 2005 in New York. Um, her registration there lists her company as step forward strategies. Although the presentation has Johnny Jennings, their former police chief who got a big payout as well. Um, his consulting firm, JCG 704, that's his company, uh, It later says Step Forward LLC and Quonect LLC serve as both strategic, architect, and execution partners. So all three of them, they've all got their own little consulting firms, and they're going to band together in order to do a $ 400, 000 contract with the sheriff's office. And then there's Racky McGregor. He's got his own firm. It lists him as a humanity, but it's spelled like humanite. So instead of a Y at the end of that word, there's an E. So this is his thing, I guess, is to take normal words and change one letter, like connect, instead of connect, spells it with a Q. This is humanity, but. He spells it with an E, with a little accent mark on the E. So humanite, catalyst. That's his position. He is a humanite catalyst. relationship centered leader and community alchemist. Why not cultural magnate as well? Why not throw that in there? A sheriff's office spokeswoman said, not my fault McFadden, the sheriff, was not present at the Zoom meeting when the team made the pitch. After the office turned them down, saying it did not have the money in its budget for this initiative, Sneed and McGregor then pitched a slimmed down version of the contract in May, according to the email from the business manager. But that too was rejected. In addition to the pitch to the sheriff's office, Hill's memo said, This month detailed other examples of how Snead worked to further McGregor's business interests. She wrote that Snead and McGregor made presentations at two different conferences last fall that highlighted the work of McGregor's wife's firm, Sid Kimmel. Yes, this is a, quote, corruption scandal. Okay, this is beyond controversy. This is a corruption scandal. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. 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