Northbrook resident Jeffrey Wolfson still has an active role on the Glenbrook High School District 225 Board of Education despite federal charges that engaged in improper financial transactions.
“I intend to serve here (on the board) as long as it’s not a distraction,” Wolfson said at Monday’s Board of Education meeting. “And I will fight this vigorously.”
Wolfson was referring to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the federal financial regulatory agency that recently charged him with violating rules on short-selling.
Wolfson, who has been a District 225 board member since 2009 and serves on the Finance Committee, allegedly took part in improper short-selling in 2006 and 2007 while registered with the Chicago Board of Options Exchange as a market-maker for Wol Corporation, according to the SEC.
Short-selling, the process of selling borrowed stocks to make money off falling prices, is not illegal. But doing so without first locating the shares and then delivering them by a specific date, as Wolfson is accused of doing, violates SEC rules.
The SEC also charged Wolfson’s brother, Robert, a broker in New York, and Golden Anchor, the entity through which Robert Wolfson traded.
The Wolfsons generated more than $17 million through improper short-selling, according to the SEC.
An SEC representative said the charges are civil matters. If an administrative law judge determines Jeffrey Wolfson violated SEC rules, he could be ordered to repay ill-gotten gains plus a fine.
He could also be barred from being a registered broker-dealer, according to the SEC.
Last week, District 225 Superintendent Mike Riggle confirmed Wolfson was still on the board.
“He’s still a board member…. We don’t really know anything except what came out from the SEC,” Riggle said following a Finance Committee Feb. 9.
Wolfson is president and founder of the Linda and Jeffrey Wolfson Foundation, an organization that benefits children and education. He serves on the boards of the YMCA of Greater Chicago, Children’s Memorial Research Center and the District 225 Foundation, according to his District 225 profile.
