Ethics complaint over alleged slap dismissed against Broward School Board member

A state commission has dismissed an ethics complaint alleging Broward School Board member Allen Zeman inappropriately slapped a district staff member on the buttocks, saying the allegation doesn’t fall within the commission’s purview.

The Florida Commission on Ethics has not yet taken any public action on a complaint against another School Board member, Brenda Fam.  She was accused of touching the buttocks of an 18-year-old student at a district-sponsored event on March 27. Both Zeman and Fam denied wrongdoing.

The Ethics Commission announced Wednesday it had dismissed an unrelated complaint against Fam involving a dispute with a neighbor, but the commission wouldn’t comment on the inappropriate touching allegation.

“I am not able to confirm or deny if there are any other complaints still under review,” commission spokeswoman Lynn Blais told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.

The school district referred the allegations against Zeman to the state Ethics Commission on March 31, the complaint shows. Fam’s case was referred on April 11, General Counsel Marylin Batista said at a School Board meeting on April 18.

The School Board debated during three meetings in April whether to hire an outside investigator to review the allegations against Zeman and Fam but ultimately decided to let the Ethics Commission handle it.

But the Ethics Commission has limited authority to intervene in these type of cases, Blais told the Sun Sentinel earlier this year.

“We do not have any authority over the sexual harassment laws. However, from time to time, we do receive complaints with sexual harassment-type allegations where there is also a use of public position to benefit oneself,” Blais said in February.

The complaint against Zeman didn’t allege that. It was filed by Chief Craig Kowalski of the district’s Special Investigative Unit.

According to the allegation outlined in the complaint, the incident happened around 3:35 p.m. Dec. 13.  Zeman’s “right hand came into contact with the male employee’s right side, near his buttocks,” the complaint states.

Zeman has said in past interviews he was trying to tap the employee on the back and missed. He has called the incident a “nothing burger.”

Reached Wednesday, Zeman said he wasn’t surprised by the Ethics Commission’s ruling.

“The Ethics Commission is supposed to look at things that violate the ethics law. I’ve done nothing that violates the ethics law,” he said. “The Ethics Commission dismissed the charge as I expected.”

The dismissal order said the male employee did not want to file a complaint or be named in it.

“Since the complaint does not allege in a non-conclusory manner that [Zeman] corruptly used his public position or any public resources to benefit himself or others or that he took a specific action as a public officer in order to benefit himself or others, the complaint fails to indicate a violation” of Florida ethics laws, the order said.

It’s unclear whether the Ethics Commission ultimately will reach the same conclusion in the complaint against Fam.

In her case, an 18-year-old student reported that Fam touched him on the behind during a March 27 event at the Signature Grand in Davie. The student alerted a district administrator and the school resource officer at his school but did not wish to file a formal complaint, Batista told the School Board in April.

Broward School Board members Brenda Fam and Allen Zeman discuss the search for a new superintendent on May 30.

Broward County Public Schools

The Florida Commission on Ethics dismissed a complaint against Broward School Board member Brenda Fam related to a dispute with a neighbor.

Since it involved a student, the administrator notified the Department of Children and Families. That department declined to review the case since the student was an 18-year-old adult, Batista said in April.

Fam said the allegation was false and called for a criminal investigation.

“I wanted to have the chance to clear my name and address my accuser, who isn’t even an accuser,” Fam told the Sun Sentinel on Wednesday, alleging it was political enemies, not the student, who were making an issue of the allegation.

Asked Wednesday if she expects to be cleared, Fam said, “Hell yeah.”

Fam asked the School Board in May to conduct an investigation into who shared the student’s name with the Sun Sentinel, alleging it was a violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, or FERPA. The Sun Sentinel did not name the student but did reach out to him for comment, and he declined.

Batista told Fam on May 22 that only students or parents of students whose privacy may have been violated can file a FERPA complaint. The consequences of a violation could be a loss of federal funding to the entire district, Batista said.

“We would be the ones liable,” Batista said at the meeting. “‘We’re not the ones that would bring the item forward for a FERPA violation to be investigated.”

Fam was also the subject of an unrelated ethics complaint that has been dismissed in her favor.

According to the Ethics Commission documents released Wednesday, Fam filed a police report Jan. 21 against her neighbor, Susan Gavin of Davie. Gavin had told Fam to “get her dog off the property or there would be problems,” which Fam considered to be a threat, according to a Davie Police report. No charges were filed.

Gavin then alleged to then-Superintendent Earlean Smiley and the Ethics Commission that Fam introduced herself to the police officer as a School Board member and “is trying to use her position on the school board as leverage for influence, power and control.”

Fam told the Sun Sentinel that’s false, that she told the officer she was a School Board member because he asked her occupation.

“At no point did Fam pressure me to document the original incident due to her position in the school board,” Davie Police Officer Caleb Smith wrote in a supplemental report that Fam shared with the Sun Sentinel.

The commission determined Gavin’s complaint, even if true, wouldn’t rise to the level of an ethics violation.

“At most, the complaint demonstrates that [Fam] attempted to use her position to impose a detriment on [Gavin], but not to obtain a benefit for herself or anyone else,” the order said. “An alleged detriment is not enough to justify an investigation.”

An Ethics Commission news release said the Zeman and Fam cases were dismissed solely because they fell outside the commission’s jurisdiction.

“As no factual investigation precedes the reviews, the Commission’s conclusions do not reflect on the accuracy of the allegations made in these complaints,” the release said.

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