THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 11, 1996 TAG: 9608110078
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY VANEE VINES, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: 133 lines
Tim Jackson considers himself one of the good guys: a God-fearing family man who looks out for others and always tries to do what's right.
And that has a lot to do with why Jackson, a School Board member and a co-defendant in a misdemeanor malfeasance trial that begins Monday, has vowed to have his day in court.
The charge stems from the school district's $12.1 million deficit in the 1994-95 fiscal year. It is illegal in Virginia for public bodies to overspend their budgets.
Jackson said he was not responsible for the deficit.
``No one is going to abuse and use Tim Jackson like this,'' he said in a recent interview at Virginia Beach's Rock Church. He has served as an associate minister there since last year.
``I'm going to stand up for my family. I'm going to stand up for what's right.
``. . . I didn't do anything wrong, and I'm going to prove it in court.''
Jackson's friends and others he's worked with say his position is in line with his nature.
``I always felt he was really conscientious . . . and seemed to be really dedicated,'' said Jane S. Brooks, president of the city's Council of PTAs, referring to her interactions with Jackson after he joined the board in 1994.
``Personally,'' she said, ``I feel he has a right to pursue this.''
State Sen. Kenneth W. Stolle, R-Virginia Beach, is a former city police officer who trained Jackson, a former cop, at the police academy.
The two have been friends for years.
``If he thinks he's right, he's going to hold out and move forward and do what he thinks is needed. That's just Timmy,'' Stolle said. ``If he thinks he's wrong, he tries to take the steps that are necessary to rectify it.''
Stolle declined to offer an opinion on the case.
But Jackson, he said, can be bullheaded sometimes - for better or worse.
``Most of my experience with Timmy is that he's on the right track about things,'' he said. ``The problem is with the case before us - what I legally understand about it - it is a strict liability case.
``If you spend more money than you have, you're in trouble. It applies to everyone.''
Jackson said he had always asked tough questions on the board and complained about any unbudgeted school district expenditures. He also said financial documents the administration shared with him indicated that the district was in the black.
He's fond of saying he believes in holding people accountable. But the deficit, which the City Council paid off, is not something he should be held accountable for, he said.
Image-conscious and politically ambitious, Jackson said he wanted to clear his name and cast a spotlight on the people or processes he believed played a role in the district's previous budget troubles.
He also decided not to go away quietly because he questions the motives of Commonwealth's Attorney Robert J. Humphreys, who supported Jackson's 1994 board campaign.
Maybe Humphreys is going after him because he's ``expendable,'' or because it might politically benefit Humphreys or ``whoever his constituents are,'' he said.
Moreover, Jackson believes Humphreys had ``no authority'' to nudge several board members to step down - in light of a scathing special grand jury report in February that urged seven of the board's 11 members to resign or be charged with malfeasance in office, punishable by a $250 fine.
Humphreys said a key reason he got involved was that he felt those board members had let the public down by failing to be good watchdogs.
Although all denied malfeasance, five board members resigned.
Jackson, whose term expires in 1998, and Ferdinand V. Tolentino, whose term expired in June, refused to resign. They will be tried together Monday.
In addition to malfeasance charges, the two men were later charged with conflict of interest and failure to disclose because they voted with six other board members last March to have the district pay their legal fees up to $25,000.
Those charges will be taken up in a separate trial next month.
The district can pay such fees for any board member when the legal action arises from a member's official activities on the board, according to state code and the board's bylaws.
But Humphreys said taxpayers should not have to pay for Jackson and Tolentino's defense.
Stolle agreed.
Jackson said the district would not have to pay any of his legal fees if he were found guilty of malfeasance. He also said he would try to repay the district for some of the fees even if he were acquitted.
The conflict-of-interest charge alone carries the possibility of a $2,500 fine and up to a year in jail.
``I'm sad that this thing had to come to where it is at now, but I'm not a criminal,'' he said. ``I'm being tried for a crime. What have I done? Where did I go wrong? It appears that I went wrong when I decided to run for the School Board.''
Jackson, a 35-year-old father of two, seems wounded by it all.
As a board candidate, he garnered 36 percent of the vote and attracted campaign contributions from backers ranging from City Council member Linwood Branch to the Virginia Beach Education Association.
A former city police officer, he retired as a sergeant in the department's D.A.R.E. Unit in 1994 after eight years on the force. The D.A.R.E. - short for Drug Abuse Resistance Education - program is a fixture in public schools.
Those who know Jackson frequently use the same word to describe him: principled.
One of eight children in his family, he was reared in Keysville, in Charlotte County. He grew up poor, the son of tobacco farmers.
He says his background made him tough and gave him a solid work ethic - even if he was on the wild side until he embraced Christianity in his early 20s, while serving in the Coast Guard in Portsmouth.
His mother, Lucille R. Jackson, still lives in the county.
``When you're guilty of something, you're ready to run,'' she said. ``Timmy's not guilty of anything. Why should he run?''
The whole affair has left many city residents torn.
In interviews last week, some said they admired Jackson's conviction, but still felt he should not have voted in favor of using tax dollars to cover legal fees.
Some said he was kidding himself if he thought he wasn't somehow responsible for the 1994-95 budget crisis - since voters elected him to the board.
And others said they were rooting for the defendants because they felt Humphreys had wasted energy and money prosecuting the case.
``I think it just takes a lot of courage (to go to trial) because the easy thing would have been for him (Jackson) to step down,'' said city activist Maury Bailey.
But the matter isn't a feel-good Kodak moment, said state Del. Leo C. Wardrup Jr., R-Virginia Beach, who knows Jackson from local Republican Party functions.
``I think what happened was unfortunate,'' he said. ``I think the folks who stepped down were all good people. But it's kind of like being the captain of a ship.
``Sometimes, things happen that you're not immediately responsible for, but there's no way to escape the responsibility.'' MEMO: Main story on page B1 and related profiles on page B3. ILLUSTRATION: Photo by D. KEVIN ELLIOTT, The Virginian-Pilot
Friends describe Tim Jackson as conscientious, if stubborn. He has
refused to resign his School Board seat, saying he has done no
wrong.
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA BEACH SCHOOL BOARD TRIAL BUDGET DEFICIT by CNB