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| Saturday, Oct 28 2006 8:30 PM
Last Updated: Saturday, Oct 28 2006 10:12 PM
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Editor's note: Some of these documents have been altered to protect privacy or to enhance clarity.
Car payment
First 5 reimbursed Nyberg's car payments for three years. The research center paid the remaining $50 each month. The deal was apparently never formalized in writing.
Lease agreement
Nyberg's 2004 lease agreement for a convertible Solara, with the "personal use" box checked.
Free car, plus mileage?
Nyberg billed hotel and food to First 5 for a Sacramento trip in 2003; he'd stopped claiming mileage when First 5 provided him a car allowance. But on a separate claim filed the same day, he billed mileage to a state drug abuse program for a Sacramento trip with the same return date.
New York computer
Cal State researchers shipped a new computer directly to the home of a New York state consultant. Later, they also charged First 5 for this software package, among other items. The consultant's claims show only 32 hours of work for the research center.
Charter flight
A charter flight brought the director of Inyo County's First 5 to a Morro Bay retreat hosted by Cal State researchers. Researchers held five overnight retreats on the public's dime, four of them in Morro Bay, through the First 5 evaluation contract.
Satchels and such
University researchers charged $1,300 worth of logo goods, including embroidered handbags to First 5.
Office furniture
A sofa and bookcases were shipped to Dr. Nyberg at Cal State Bakersfield.
News from First 5 Kern
Read executive director Steve Ladd's special edition newsletter debunking The Californian’s story. Some information in the newsletter, sent by First 5 Kern Oct. 26, differs from answers Ladd originally provided The Californian for this story.
Inn at Morro Bay
$11,504 (Payments made directly to the inn)
Research center staffers went on three Morro Bay retreats in December 2001, December 2002 and March 2004.
A fourth retreat, in January 2003, included a half-dozen First 5 directors -- which included Kern chief Steve Ladd and heads of county commissions in Inyo.
Another retreat for Tulare, Kings, Madera and Fresno counties was attended by Nyberg and one other faculty researcher. Laura Hecht, also attended one night, receipts show.
Mileage for staffers to and from the resorts, or in some cases car rentals, was also paid.
Plane ride
$1,800
Inyo County's First 5 director, Kathy Peterson, flew to the Morro Bay staff retreat on a plane chartered to bring her from Bishop to San Luis Obispo in January 2003.
Ladd, the local First 5 director, said commercial flights were not available and the drive would have been 8 to 10 hours each way.
Sofa
$601.46
A pewter-colored "fully upholstered" sofa was delivered to "Dr. Nyberg's conference room" at Cal State Bakersfield in September 2002. Ladd said in an e-mail he had no record of the sofa purchase.
The delivery also included two bookcases and totaled more then $1,400.
Another $6,500 worth of furniture was shipped to the researchers' new satellite office in Fresno in February 2002. But movers trucked those items to Bakersfield when the office closed two years later.
Fashion
$893.42
Forty golf shirts, in men's and women's designs emblazoned with the Applied Research Center's logo, were shipped to researchers in July 2002.
Researchers also ordered a dozen embroidered "suburban saddlebags" separately, bringing logo goods to more than $1,300.
Wall maps
$2,129.08
A pair of framed, laminated maps for each of four counties -- Inyo, Kern, Kings and Tulare were ordered by researchers in March 2004.
Cross-country computer
$3,875
A fully loaded Optiplex GX240, with a 21-inch monitor, shipped straight from Dell to the Varysburg, N.Y., home of consultant Nora O'Neill, in April 2002.
Her purchase of software and a modem was also reimbursed between October 2001 and November 2002.
Her purchases of a full-blown version of the Windows operating system, antivirus programs and statistical software were also reimbursed.
That consultant submitted just one work receipt to the Applied Research Center, an $800 bill for 32 hours of work on "desktop publishing and data presentation" in February 2002.
There are no other bills in the Cal State documents showing the consultant did any other work for researchers.
In mid-October, Cal State Bakersfield officials could not immediately locate this or at least 23 other computers researchers bought with First 5 money, but said they believed all could be accounted for.
Ladd said in an e-mail he has no record of the transaction. An electronic newsletter Ladd sent to First 5 Kern stakeholders Thursday afternoon said Cal State officials had told him the equipment was donated to a local charity.
Read the entire newsletter on the Web at www.bakersfield.com
Source: More than 3,500 pages of receipts provided by Cal State Bakersfield. Campus officials say all receipts the Applied Research Center submitted to First 5 for reimbursement since 2001 were included.