Both Sides in MALDEF Dispute Agree to Let Board of Directors Decide Who’s Boss

Both sides in the power struggle over who is head of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund agreed Friday to have the dispute resolved at a Feb. 28 special meeting of MALDEF’s 34-member board of directors.

Until that time, Antonia Hernandez, 38, can keep her job as the civil rights group’s president and general counsel. Former New Mexico Gov. Toney Anaya, hired by the board’s executive committee to replace Hernandez after she had been fired Jan. 17, had been scheduled to take over Sunday.

The compromise, in the form of a stipulated judgment, was signed by state District Judge Rose Spector in San Antonio. Sources familiar with the dispute said it was an attempt to calm the controversy that has engulfed MALDEF since Hernandez’s surprise firing.

‘Let Things Simmer Down’

“This is to let things simmer down so MALDEF, the organization, won’t be damaged any further by this hassle,” said a MALDEF board member who asked not to be identified.

The agreement was reached after daylong negotiations preceding a court hearing over a lawsuit filed by Hernandez charging that she had been illegally fired by the 15-member executive committee. She had argued in court papers that only MALDEF’s full board could fire her.

Last week Hernandez won a temporary restraining order delaying Anaya’s appointment and had gone to court Friday to extend the ruling into February.

Under the stipulated judgment, Hernandez and executive committee members:

- Admitted to no wrongdoing on their part in the dispute.

- Consented to a “gag” order that prohibits them from making disparaging remarks publicly about one another to news reporters and other media personnel.

- Agreed that no MALDEF board member or staff worker can use the organization’s telephones and other resources during business hours to lobby board members to a particular point of view in the dispute.

Board Chairman’s Charge

The last point was particularly important to MALDEF board Chairman Eric P. Serna of Santa Fe, N.M., who had charged that the staff had been using its time at work to lobby for Hernandez’s retention. The 60 staffers in MALDEF’s four regional offices and the Los Angeles headquarters had sent out letters, endorsing Hernandez, on official MALDEF stationery to board members shortly after she was fired.

According to the compromise, Hernandez’s status and the membership of the board’s Personnel and Nominations Committee are the only items to be considered at the Feb. 28 meeting.

Hernandez and her supporters have claimed that the Personnel and Nominations Committee, which recommended her dismissal to the executive committee, was “stacked” against her. Serna and committee Chairman Manual Sanchez, a Los Angeles lawyer, have denied the charge.