51.7 F
Reno

School District wants to hire outside legal counsel for its meetings

Date:

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

The Washoe County School District board of trustees will consider tomorrow an agenda item to hire an outside attorney to monitor board meetings. The amount is for a $35,000 retainer.

“The primary concern and responsibility of the [WCSD’s office of general counsel] is that of protecting the District from liability and providing support to our schools and departments,” the agenda item notes. “The proposal to hire Independent Board Counsel will allow the OGC to achieve its mission of protecting the District from litigation and provide counsel to prevent future litigation.”

The past year and half, according WCSD, has seen the school district’s legal office spending “an inordinate amount of time on Board matters such as meetings of the Board, agenda creation, workshops of the Board on Board Governance, Board Leadership Team meetings after the Board meetings, consultation with Trustees regarding Board Policies, and attempting to assist with the resolution of Trustee matters,” the agenda continues.  

It is proposed the hired attorney will “decrease attorney costs by being able to manage more litigation in-house,” staff noted.

Other agenda items

Trustees will also revisit the second investigation into the change of residence of its former Trustee Jacqueline Calvert. The first investigation didn’t include key information, so the district hired the same law firm again to re-do the investigation. WCSD said the second investigation will be made public after the meeting starts tomorrow.

The search firm selected to hire the district’s next superintendent will be provided more direction on how to proceed with hiring Superintendent Kristen McNeill’s replacement.   

The board will also consider hiring a firm so the board “can compromise to work better as a team by hiring of Deb Darby and/or Randy Manner to conduct professional development, Board training, and ongoing coaching for the Board of Trustees.”

Bob Conrad
Bob Conradhttp://thisisreno.com
Bob Conrad is publisher, editor and co-founder of This Is Reno. He has served in communications positions for various state agencies and earned a doctorate in educational leadership from the University of Nevada, Reno in 2011. He is also a part time instructor at UNR and sits on the boards of the Nevada Press Association and Nevada Open Government Coalition.

TRENDING

RENO EVENTS

MORE RENO NEWS

School district seeks community feedback on math curriculum

Washoe County School District officials said that they want to hear from the community about new math materials for K-5 students.