The Rialto Unified Board of Education has extended the employment contract of interim Superintendent Judy White for one year as an investigation continues into allegations of misconduct by top managers in the district’s Nutrition Services department.
The board voted unanimously on Wednesday, June 11, to extend White’s contract through June 30, 2026 and have her serve as an “executive coach” to district administrators to help improve their performance and efficiency. In February, the board voted 3-2, with board members Edgar Montes and Evelyn Dominguez dissenting, to appoint the retired Riverside County superintendent of schools to the temporary post until June 30.
Within two weeks of her appointment, White commissioned a forensic audit and internal investigation of the Nutrition Services department after learning of allegations that the department’s top managers, for years, allegedly inflated student meal counts to receive more reimbursement — possibly millions of extra dollars — from state and federal programs.
Additionally, Nutrition Services Lead Agent Fausat Rahman-Davies, Assistant Agent Maria Rangel, and former program innovator Kristina Kraushaar are accused of misappropriating food by using it for special events or handing it out to friends, family members, school board members and other district employees instead of using it for students or disposing of it as the law requires.
Rahman-Davies and Rangel are on administrative leave. Kraushaar left the district in February to take a job as the food service director for Chaffey Joint Union High School District in Ontario.
District spokesperson Syeda Jafri confirmed that Rangel will be retiring this year.
The shakeup comes amid a five-month investigation by the Southern California News Group into allegations of corruption by school board members and top-level managers and administrators in the district.
The allegations first surfaced in the summer of 2023, and were under investigation by a forensics auditor hired by former Superintendent Cuauhtemoc Avila when the schools chief was abruptly placed on leave in May 2024 by the school board and the probe was “paused,” district officials said. He was replaced by Edward D’Souza, a lead academic agent for the district, as the acting superintendent — a position he held for nine months, until White’s appointment.
In February, the school board unanimously voted to fire Avila, without cause.
Jafri also confirmed D’Souza will be retiring this year as well. District officials have neither confirmed nor denied whether it was D’Souza who suspended the initial audit of Nutrition Services commissioned by Avila.
The extension of White’s contract comes more than two months into the forensic audit and administrative investigation, with no indication when either will conclude. Jafri said the California Department of Education’s Nutrition Services Division now is conducting a parallel investigation into the allegations to ensure “thoroughness and accountability.”
Department of Education spokesman Scott Roark said the department cannot comment on a pending investigation.
Officials with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the federal government’s child nutrition and national school lunch programs, did not respond to multiple requests for comment on whether they were investigating the allegations at Rialto Unified.
Meanwhile, the district will be searching for a permanent replacement for White in the next year. The board on Wednesday also approved the hiring of the Illinois-based consulting and executive search firm Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates to conduct the search for the next superintendent at a cost of $100,000.
“I look forward to continuing to serve the Rialto Unified School District as they search and find their new permanent superintendent,” White said in a statement, adding that the new superintendent will continue functioning as an executive coach to administrators upon her departure.
“It is my goal to conclude all open investigations within a reasonable time frame,” White said.
Nutrition Services Supervisor Sarah Dunbar-Riley, who initially brought the data falsification allegations forward in June 2023, helped reignite the audit in March with a four-page statement to White with a detailed summary of the data falsification and food misappropriation allegations and alleged misconduct by the department’s three top managers.
Additionally, Dunbar-Riley said in her letter that, as punishment for speaking out, she was yanked from her office in Nutrition Services in January 2024 and sequestered to the office of Derek Harris, the district’s lead risk management and transportation agent, and directed to not to have any contact with nutrition employees. She has remained working out of Harris’ office ever since.
Christine Acosta, president of the Rialto chapter of the California School Employees Association, which represents Rialto Unified’s nutrition workers, said in a telephone interview Friday she was pleased to hear that White will be staying on with the district another year.
“I think it’s going to be beneficial to the district given the extent of her knowledge and experience. It’s going to be great for us,” said Acosta, adding that many Nutrition Services employees, despite White’s presence and the ongoing audit, remain wary and distrustful of the current management structure in the department.
“They’re fearful of repercussions — if they say anything regarding this whole issue that’s going on there, the scandal. They know a lot, but they don’t want to say anything,” Acosta said of the employees. “You have to remember this has been a culture that has been going on for many, many years. … They’re afraid to say anything, they’re afraid to step out of line. They’re afraid of being thrust into something they don’t want to be a part of. They just want to do their jobs and serve the students with integrity and care.”
