California’s State Librarian Greg Lucas faces accusations of mishandling nearly $650,000 in funds for Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, a program delivering free books to children statewide since 2023, following legislation with $68M in funding.
The now-closed Strong Reader Partnership nonprofit received millions but reported $1.2M spent against only ~$555K in bank records, leaving ~$650K unaccounted for. In a budget hearing, Sen. Shannon Grove (R) pressed Lucas on missing documentation requested six times, demanding “Where’s the money?” and stating the situation “reeks of horrific no transparency and potential fraud.” Lucas, who was appointed in 2014, promised answers.
Laying into State Librarian Greg Lucas during the Senate budget hearing on education, State Sen. Shannon Grove (R), asked: “Where’s the money?“You don’t have receipts requested six times. You don’t have bank statements requested six times from this committee. … That makes no sense, and that reeks of horrific no transparency and potential fraud.”
Desperate to defend himself, Greg Lucas claimed, “I don’t believe that’s correct… we received a final report on the disposition of the money by the Strong Reader Partnership, which has expressed… the difficulty in obtaining some of this information because they no longer have any money or members of the partnership.”
Refusing to let him get off easy, Grove pointed out, “You don’t have documents to show where that money was spent. You can’t show that even the money that was allocated for $5,000 … where any resources were used to reach the kids that want to foster a love for reading.”
“As I’ve said before, and I’ll say it again, we’ve pledged to get you the answers that you want. We’ve requested them over and over again. So now we have a deadline of a week, and we’ll get them to you by then,” the librarian retorted.
Likewise concerned, State Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Pasadena), the subcommittee chair, said, “I find this to be incredibly concerning. There’s $650,000 that’s been unaccounted for in a program, a bipartisan effort that was intended to increase literacy among children. This is incredibly serious.”
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Issuing an official statement, a spokesperson for the California State Library alleged, “The California State Library takes its responsibility seriously to ensure transparency and accountability in the taxpayer dollars entrusted to it.”
The embattled agency added, “The State Library has provided the Legislature with all documentation in its possession and has repeatedly requested additional records from the Strong Reader partnership. The California State Library remains committed to cooperating fully with all legislative oversight and maintaining accountability in the administration of public funds.”
Breaking down the situation, Susan Shelley, of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, asked, “Why are so many public spending programs offloaded to non-governmental organizations, and where is the oversight once that happens?
Building on that point, she noted, “When the law says there must be reports, that’s an attempt at accountability. All these contracts should be scrutinized for conflict of interest (to ensure there’s no) insider deal to enrich friends.”
This is far from the only fraud, waste, and corruption that has been suspected and discovered in California. Watch Dr. Oz comment on the fraud in the state in late October: