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[quote=Anonymous]from Today's Washington Business Journal

Whittle School CEO tells D.C. faculty, staff his plan for covering missed pay

The Whittle School & Studios is looking to sell off its D.C. assets in order to pay its former teachers and other staff members for the paychecks they’re still owed, CEO and Chairman Chris Whittle said in a letter he sent Monday to former employees.

In the email, obtained by the Washington Business Journal, Whittle said the company’s liquidity was fully depleted to fund operations during the 2021-2022 academic year. So the next step to fund employee back pay, he wrote, is to sell off the school's intellectual property and fixtures and equipment left inside 4000 Connecticut Ave. NW, where the D.C. private pre-K-12 boarding school resided until it abruptly shut down July 8 due to lack of financing.

“Since the closure announcement, that is what I have been working upon,” Whittle said in his email to employees, which was sent three days after the Business Journal reported that employees terminated July 8 are still missing at least three paychecks.

Whittle said in the note that he’s in talks with four parties as potential buyers for those assets and added the private education company could be eligible for some tax credits that could take up to six months to finalize, but did not lay out details about either.

It is unclear who those potential buyers are, how much such a sale would generate or if a deal will go through. Whittle declined to comment further for this story.

“I am hopeful these efforts will pay off too, but I do not know that for sure at this moment,” he wrote in his email, adding that he will update former employees on the progress of such a deal by Aug. 15.

In the email, Whittle also apologized for “being out of touch” for the previous three weeks since the D.C. campus closed, when roughly 40 employees were laid off. “I deeply regret the difficulties that this has caused you and please know I am working every day to help,” he wrote.

A lower school teacher, who requested anonymity over fear of impact on her future employment, told the Washington Business Journal that she has been so focused on navigating her termination and her family’s health insurance that she hasn’t had time to start looking for a new job. She said she appreciated Chris Whittle’s letter, but felt he was out of touch with how much former employees have struggled.

“Total silence has not been good,” she said. “It’s hard to read that and the timing and it to feel authentic. How is this authentic this many weeks into the game when we’ve been sweating?”

Whittle said that teachers have been prioritized first for any available funds to receive owed pay and health benefits, with D.C. campus operations ranked second, D.C. campus leadership third, global leadership fourth and himself last.

“The fact that we missed our last payroll (and a portion of another) for faculty is what caused me to make the decision to not go forward,” Whittle wrote in the email about the decision to close the campus last month. “I did not think we should go forward if we could not meet our first priority.”

He said he used his “last personal resources” to keep health benefits intact for the rest of the month after the July 8 closure and official termination a few days later. Health benefits for Whittle School employees were scheduled to end July 31.

The lower school teacher said she’s spent days on the phone with her former employer's health insurance provider, which she identified as CareFirst, as well as the Department of Labor and Maryland health insurance contacts to figure out her coverage. It wasn’t until Sunday that Whittle School leadership sent employees the number to call for COBRA benefits, she said, confirmed by a copy of the email obtained by the Business Journal. Prior to that message, she said she couldn’t receive post-employment benefits because she didn’t have the official go-ahead for insurers to proceed, and she was disqualified from public health insurance.

Chris Whittle also said in his message to employees that since he founded the company almost eight years ago, he put "every dollar" he had into the school, noting the total topped $25 million. He previously told the Washington Business Journal that he mortgaged his home to generate funds for the Whittle School & Studios.

Separately, Pure East Global Investments Ltd., a British Virgin Islands company that holds mortgages and loan debt, is currently suing Chris Whittle to foreclose on two commercial mortgages on his former home in East Hampton, New York, at 90 and 100 Briar Patch Road, according to documents filed in Suffolk Supreme Court in New York. Pure East claims Chris Whittle hasn't paid required annual interest payments on two mortgages, each about $25 million and one now valued at $40 million, according to its complaint.

Chris Whittle, who doesn’t have a listed attorney in the court docket, has not responded to the case and declined to comment on this lawsuit. On July 13, Pure East’s attorney filed a motion asking Judge Robert Quinlan for summary judgment. [/quote]

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