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As the bell rings signaling the endof fourth period, Jeffersontown HighSchools hallways quickly fill withstudents hurrying to their next class.

Standing nearby, principal MartyPolliocanthelpnoticing that thehall-ways and classrooms are morecrowded this year.

Weve definitely had a growthspurt, said Pollio, who is in his fifth

year as principal. This year, we areat the highest enrollment this school

has seen since 1986.Now at 1,366 students 184 more

than last year Jeffersontown Highsaw the largest enrollment jump ofany of Jefferson Countys 155 publicschools this year. But it isnt the onlyone experiencing growth.

New figures released for the 2011-12 school year show that enrollment

across Jefferson County PublicSchools has reached 100,534 students thehighest enrollment in 25 years.

District officials credit a combina-tion of factors for the steady growth,

Jeffersontown High freshman Barnabas Olatoyan works on a problem in his engineering design class recently.The school grew by 184 students this year, the biggest increase in the district. JOHN ROTT/THE COURIER-JOURNAL

METRO EDITION L O UI S VI L LE , K EN T UC K Y courier-journal.com S U N D A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 3 , 2 0 1 1 USPS 135560

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After nearly being swept inTuesdays statewide elections,Republicans gathered in Louis-ville Saturday to rally aroundtheir sole victor and look to thefuture.

Its a future that they say isstill bright despite the fact thatfour of their six candidates forstate constitutional officeslost in

landslides.Were going to hold the stateSenate next year. ... Lets makehistory in Kentucky and take theHouse of Representatives, U.S.Senate Minority Leader MitchMcConnell said, rallying the Re-publican Party of Kentuckys ex-ecutive committeeat party head-quartersin eastern Louisville.

Dont lose heart. We have agreat chance of making BarackObama a one-term president, areal chance to have a Kentucky

Republican legislature entirelyandwillhelpchangeAmericaandchange the commonwealth, hesaid.

In Tuesdays elections, onlystate Rep. James Comer won hiselection for agriculture com-missioner, arguablythe least con-sequential of all the statewide of-ficeson theballot.Theonlyotherrace that was close was for statetreasurer, in which incumbent

ELECTION 2011| THE AFTERMATH

Rep. James Comer, who was electedagriculture commissioner, spoke Saturdayto fellow Republicans. KYLENE LLOYD/THE C-J

GOP optimistic, despite lossesKy. Republicans rally, salute their sole winner

By JosephGerthjgerth@courier-journal.comThe Courier-Journal

SeeELECTION,PageA8

I thinkRepublicans haveburned the voters

out on socialissues and onnationalizingissues. In a badeconomy, peoplewant to know,What can you doto help me? REP. JAMES COMER

An uncommon provision in the by-laws of the nonprofit corporation thatmarkets fertilizer for the Metropolitan

Sewer District requires that longtimeMSD board attorney Larry Zielke alsomust be the nonprofits lawyer.

Zielke, whose role at MSD has comeunder scrutinyby the Kentuckyauditorthisyear, draftedthe bylawsin 2005thatspell out his unique relationship with

LouisvilleGreen Corp.,according to MSDspokesman Steve Ted-der.

The bylaws, whichspecify that LouisvilleGreen shall employZielke as special legalcounsel, also stipulatethat the bylaws can

only be changed if six of eight boardmembers agree. MSD board membersalso serve as Louisville Green boardmembers, and some also are LouisvilleGreen officers.

The arrangement provides Zielkewith more protection than he has withMSD, wherehe serves under a contractapproved by a simple board majority.

Expertssay the Louisville Green by-lawslanguage is unusual andcan poten-tiallytie the hands ofMSD officialsandcostratepayers more money.

University of Louisville professorSteven G. Koven, a government ethicsexpertand author of the2008 book, Re-

MSD attorney Larry Zielke has madelittle from Louisville Green. C-J FILE PHOTO

Bylawsgive roleto MSDattorneyZielke represents firmthat markets fertilizerBy James Bruggersjbruggers@courier-journal.com

The Courier-Journal

SUNDAY

PRINTEXCLUSIVE

Available onlyin your print

edition today

SeeZIELKE, Page A9

High schools lead way; economy, choices cited

ONTHEWEBTo see a data-base showingJCPS enrollmentat each schoolfor this year andlast, find this

story at courier-journal.com

ByAntoinetteKonzakonz@courier-journal.com

The Courier-Journal

JCPS = 155 SCHOOLS, 100,534 STUDENTS

growth spurtgrowth spurt

SeeJCPS,Page A12

MORE THAN

IN COUPONS$190IN TODAYS

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8/3/2019 Zielke Lou Green

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sponsibleGovernance:A CaseStudy Approach, said thatsuch sweetheart deals usual-ly benefit insiders but in theend cost consumers.

Tedder, however, down-played the significance of thebylawsastheyapplytoZielke,

noting that Louisville Greenhas hadlessthan$17,000in le-gal expenses since its found-ing in 2005 and that its boardcould contract with anotherattorney if it wanted.

This isnt exclusive, Ted-der said.

Buta veteranLouisville at-torney who has handled high-profile civil and criminalcases disagreed,citingthe im-portanceof the bylaws useofthe word shall in relation tousing Zielkes services.

Shall means you have gottodoit,saidattorneyThomasClay, when asked to interpretthe meaning of the bylawslanguage. Thats a well-rec-ognized principle of the law.Otherwise, you use the termmay, he said.

Zielke wrote in an emailthat he recalls that the boardapproved the bylaws naminghimLouisvilleGreenattorneyto be consistent with my be-ingspecial counselto theMSDboard (and) to avoid duplica-tive costs and/or conflictinglegal advice.

Waste to fertilizerLouisville Green Corp.

sells and distributes Louis-villeGreen,afertilizerusedatgolf courses and tree farms,and onsuchcropsas cornand

soybeans. Its made fromwaste from the Louisvillesewer system that is turnedinto pellets according to stateand U.S. Environmental Pro-tection Agency safety stan-dards.

Havinga separatecorpora-tion helps shield MSD and itsratepayers from potential li-abilityassociatedwiththefer-tilizer, andmakes it easierfora marketing contractor to sellthe fertilizer in other states,Tedder said.

By turning biosolids intofertilizer, MSD no longer haslarge landfill disposal costs,Tedder said. During fiscal2010,for example,MSD savedabout $600,000in landfillfees,Marion Gee, former districtfinance director, wrote in aJuly 26, 2010, memo.

Questions about MSDs

Louisville Green operationarethe latestto surface at theagency in a year of disclo-sures by The Courier-Journalthat have resulted in a dozenstate auditors working atMSD, poring overagencyrec-ords and talking with districtofficials about management,contracting and ethics issues.

Janet Cantrill, executiveassistant to Auditor Crit Lual-len, confirmed that the audi-tors office was aware theLouisville Green situation.Cantrill declined to commentfurther.

Luallen has said her staffwill produce its report andrecommendation to MayorGregFischerby theendof theyear.

Fischer called for the auditof MSD management June 7,after the newspaper reportedon three board membersbusiness ties to MSD and bo-nuses and merit raises to thedistricts top employees dur-ing the recession.

In July, the mayor an-nounced that Luallen wouldoversee the audit herself, in-stead of contracting with aprivate firm, after the news-paper disclosed a 2008 MSDinternal review of Zielke.

The newspaper reportedthat the internal audit raised

questions about billing prac-tices at his former law firmand asserted that MSD hadgiven too much trust and au-thorityto Zielke in determin-ing legal strategy, saying thatcreated a conflict of interestthatcould benefit him.

Zielke has disputed thosefindings and disparaged thequality of the internal audit.

Using documents obtainedunder the Kentuckyopen rec-ords law, the newspaper pre-viously found that MSD has

paid the attorney at least $5.9million since Jan. 1, 2006,while it also employed fourstaff attorneys.

Government and nonprofitexperts called the LouisvilleGreenbylaws languagepoten-tially troublesome. Normally,theysaid,legalserviceswouldbe obtained through a con-

tract,such astheone MSD haswithZielke.

Mandating in an organiza-tions bylaws that a specificpersonwill behired for a spe-cific job violates basic princi-ples of free-market competi-tion, saidKoven, who directsU of Ls master of public ad-ministration degree program.This is,at a minimum,highlyinefficient since it precludesthepossibility of hiring betterqualified people at a lowercost.

An odd arrangementKevin Connelly, executive

directoroftheCenterforNon-profit Excellence in Louis-ville, which offers trainingand advice to nonprofit or-ganizations, called the ar-rangement odd.

Havinganattorneywritteninto the bylaws could defi-nitely be an incumbrance ondecision making flexibilityof the organizations leader-ship, Connelly said.

Fred Dallenbach, who wasMSDs chairman when theLouisville Green bylaws wereadopted, said he could not re-call why Zielke was named inthe bylaws. I have no idea,andIdonotwishtocomment,Dallenbach said.

Arnold Celentano, MSD

chairman and LouisvilleGreen president, also de-clined to comment, referringa reporter to Tedder, who re-sponded, There is no real in-stitutional knowledge whythat language is in there.

Tedder said he spoke withCelentano, and thatCelentanotold him that the MSD boardwould decide on Zielkes fu-ture role with LouisvilleGreen and any potential by-laws changes as part of anoverall look at MSDs legal

contracting that the board in-tends to do after Luallens re-port is finished.

Board members alreadyhave moved to curb Zielkesrolewith MSD, at leasttempo-rarily.

In August they voted toplace Zielke, who has hadMSD as a client for 25 years,

ona month-to-monthcontract,expiring with the completionofthe auditors report. Hewaspreviously on a year-to-yearcontract.

Documents providedto thenewspaper last week by MSDunder the Kentucky OpenRecords Act confirm Teddersassertion that Zielke has notmade much money fromLouisville Green.

They show Zielke billedMSD forabout $13,000in 2005and$3,000in2006forworkas-sociatedwithsettingup Louis-ville Green. Since then,Zielkes billings list about$850 in charges specificallyrelated to Louisville Green.

Under thearrangement be-tween MSD and LouisvilleGreen, Louisville Green hasnoassets other than the fertil-izer pellets themselves, Ted-der said.Louisville Green hasa contract with the businessA-J Inc. to market, sell anddistribute the fertilizer, hesaid.

A-J Vice President ClarkeFenimore described the busi-ness as a husband-and-wifeoperation. His wife, AlbertaFenimore, is president, hesaid.

The agreement splits salesrevenue 50-50 between A-JInc. and Louisville Green,

which passes its proceeds toMSD. Thatamounted to about$286,000 foreach side in 2010,MSD records show.

Clarke Fenimore said A-Jclearsonlyaboutabout25per-cent to 30 percent of its por-tionof thesales, after market-ing expenses across as manyas 13 states. I pay all the ad-vertising,promotion andtrav-el, he said.

Reporter James Bruggers can be

reached at (502) 582-4645.

ZIELKE: Firms bylaws secure role for MSD attorneyContinued from Page A1

DETROIT Police in suburban Detroitmistakenly arrested the head of a popularArab-American cultural center and heldhim overnight in jail, believing he was amanchargedin a conspiracyto funnelmon-ey to Hezbollahfrom the sale of stolenandcounterfeit goods.

Dearborn police claiming to be investi-gating a break-in asked Ali Hammoud foridentification and arrested him outside hishomeFridaynight,attorney Majed Mough-ni said. They said they had a warrant forhis arrest, he said. He was coming backfrom a dinner, a family gathering.

But policehad the wrong Hammoud.A manwiththe same name wasindicted

with 18 people in Detroit in 2003 in a con-spiracy involving the sale of illegal ciga-rettes, counterfeit Viagra and stolen goodsto support Hezbollah, which the U.S. con-siders a terrorist group. That man has notbeen found. AnFBIagentwent tothe Dear-bornpolice station Saturdayand toldHam-moud he was not the man wanted by au-thorities, Moughni said.

Hammoud is president of Bint JebailCulturalCenter in Dearborn, a Detroit sub-urbthatshometooneofthelargestMuslimpopulations in the U.S. Thecenter hasheldceremonies for new U.S.citizens and spon-sored speeches by prominent governmentofficials, including CIA Director Leon Pa-netta,in 2009.

Dearbornpolicehad no immediate com-ment. FBIspokeswomanSandra Berchtoldsaidpolicearrestedamanwhofitadescrip-tion on a federal warrant, but the FBI wasnotdirectlyinvolved in thearrest.

Moughni said Hammouddid notwanttocomment about the incident.Hes very well respected and liked.

People are angry, the lawyer said. If thiscan happen to a pillar of the community, itcan happen to anyone.

Osama Siblani, publisher of The ArabAmericanNews in Dearborn, saidhe calledDearborns police chief and the FBI to tellthem they hadthe wrong man.

The charges are unbelievable, Siblanisaid. He has raised three doctors, a verydown-to-earth guy. For me to evenimaginehe would do something like this is beyondmy imagination.

Arab-Americancenters leadermistakenlyjailed in Mich.By EdWhiteAssociated Press