For the second time in a month, a former board member for a charter school network in Baton Rouge is accused of violating state ethics law when she accepted lucrative contracts from the schools she oversaw.
Linda Johnson is accused of accepting money from GEO Academies EBR while she served on its board. She was a founding member of the board and its longtime president.
Last month, the Louisiana Board of Ethics brought charges against another former GEO board member, Linda Fontenot, who allegedly accepted contracts worth $108,000 between 2021 and 2026. Fontenot faces a fine of up to $10,000. She also could have to repay some or all of the money she earned, plus potential additional penalties.
Johnson is accused of accepting more than $250,000 worth of business from that same board for all but three years she served on the board.
Unlike her former colleague, Johnson looks as if she has worked out a deal.
On Friday the state ethics board is considering entering into a consent opinion with Johnson that would settle its legal issues with her. The short document gives a summary of how Johnson violated the law, but it does not detail any of the settlement terms.
The board is also set to consider a second consent opinion that deals with an unnamed GEO board member who was “providing services” to the charter network within two years of leaving the board, which is illegal under state ethics law.
Both proposed opinions were posted online Wednesday.
Johnson is well-known in school circles, having served from 1999 to 2011 on the state’s Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, or BESE, including a stint as its president.
In November 2013, Johnson joined the GEO Academies EBR board and in 2014 accepted a $50,000 consulting contract to “help develop” the Indiana-based charter group as it sought to take root in Louisiana, according to the consent opinion. During that time, BESE approved the first of four charters with GEO.
For a five-year stretch from 2018 to when she left GEO in 2023, Johnson was hired again as a consultant for GEO “to focus on Louisiana growth, board development, state government affairs, and school development” starting at $3,000 a month and increasing to $4,000 a month in February 2022, according to the consent opinion. That adds up to more than $200,000.
Johnson resigned from the GEO board in June 2023 after nearly a decade of service. Fontenot resigned the following month after eight years on the board.
First Fontenot and now Johnson are accused of violating a state law that states “no appointed member of any board or commission, member of his immediate family, or legal entity in which he has a substantial economic interest” can even pursue “a contract, subcontract, or other transaction which is under the supervision or jurisdiction of the agency of such appointed member.”
In 2013, Johnson agreed to pay a $1,000 fine for violating state conflict of interest laws. The violation involved the Texas Turkish American Chamber of Commerce paying for Johnson to travel to Turkey while she was a member of BESE.
The GEO Academies EBR board has contracts with the state of Louisiana to operate three charter schools in Baton Rouge and one in Baker. The board, since its inception in 2013, has contracted with Indiana-based GEO Foundation to run its growing network in Louisiana.
Charter schools are public schools run privately via charters, or contracts.
Johnson and Kevin Teasley, president and co-founder of GEO Foundation, did not respond Wednesday to requests for comment.
