PTA Treasurer Charged With Embezzling $47,000

An Agoura Hills PTA treasurer was charged Tuesday with embezzling $47,000--the group’s entire budget--over nearly a year.

The loss of funds may force cash-strapped Yerba Buena Elementary School to cancel parent-funded classes in art and computers, parents and school officials said.

Mary Kathleen Stevens, 29, of Agoura Hills, arranged through her attorney to surrender Thursday in Malibu Municipal Court, Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Wilson said.

Stevens is charged with one count of grand theft for allegedly stealing the money from the coffers of the Yerba Buena Parent-Faculty Assn. during her tenure as the group’s treasurer. The Agoura school serves about 625 kindergartners to fifth-graders and is one of seven elementary schools in the Calabasas-based Las Virgenes Unified School District.

The parent-faculty group safeguards against such abuses by requiring two signatures on all of the organization’s checks, Wilson said. However, the president of the group had signed several blank checks over to Stevens, Wilson said.

Caryn Gussin, president of the Yerba Buena Parent-Faculty Assn., declined to discuss specifics of the case but said parents and students were angry and depressed that the group’s funds were all gone.

“That’s our entire budget,” Gussin said. “We’re very surprised that a mother with a child in our school would do something like this. We rely on trust from our parents.”

The $47,000 represented money that had been accumulated over the past five years to help pay for library aides, part-time teachers in music, art and computers, and other educational programs that the district could not afford.

The organization spends about $25,000 to $30,000 a year, Gussin said, but still owes the district about $15,000 for specialty teachers hired during the last school year. This school year, which begins next month, the school will probably have to cancel music, art and computer classes, Gussin said.

“Our kids are the victims,” she said. “They’re not going to have the things they had in the past. That’s why everyone is so angry.”

The theft was discovered when an association check bounced, Wilson said.

The association contacted the school district about two weeks ago and asked for help, said Don Zimring, assistant superintendent for business.

“I went through their books and records and determined there were irregularities,” said Zimring, who then contacted the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

When Stevens failed to repay the missing money, charges were filed against her, Wilson said. The prosecutor said he planned to ask that Stevens’ bail be set at $25,000.

Some of those who knew her on the parent-teacher organization said they were amazed. “She was a very hard-working parent who seemed very interested in helping us out,” Gussin said.

Times staff writer John Johnson contributed to this story.