Board of Education Questions Lawyer Fees

Upset that attorney fees for a hotly debated overhaul of its administrative policies have gone over budget, the county Board of Education agreed Monday to fire off a letter to its Sacramento lawyers questioning certain charges.

The board’s conservative majority, which routinely clashes with county schools Supt. Charles Weis on issues that include AIDS education for teachers, voted last year to pay a law firm as much as $30,000 to update board regulations.

The most recent bill submitted by the firm of Kronick, Moskovitz, Tiedemann and Girard states that the board owes $6,063.63 more than it budgeted last year for the project, with the total expected to rise by as much as another $1,000 if the firm completes the job.

“I would like to see this [bill] explained for exaggerated expenses,” said board member Wendy Larner, who represents the five-member board’s majority along with Angela Miller and President Marty Bates.

The elected officials gathered with Weis and his staff in Camarillo to talk about the policy changes for the fifth time during an all-day meeting.

The conservative members of the panel say policy review is needed to revise outdated guidelines and to gain more oversight of the $39-million budget.

But critics have countered that the school board began the process to find ways to exert more control over Weis.

“I think their attempts to limit the responsibility of the superintendent is going beyond the law,” said Janet Lindgren, who announced plans to run against Larner in November.

The board, which has already settled most of the lawyer bills, decided to hold off on paying the $6,000 in question until the firm explains certain charges. The more than $1,500 billed for the creation of an elaborate chart detailing both the superintendent and board’s duties raised the most concern.

But Jan Damesyn, a shareholder with the firm and one of the lawyers assigned to the policy revision project, said that the chart required significant research and the cost was reasonable and legitimate.

“We don’t have anything to sell but our time, and the bills reflect the time that was spent,” Damesyn said in an interview from Sacramento.

Despite earlier versions of the revisions that gave the board the authority to tell Weis how to implement specific board policy, the changes discussed Monday left that responsibility in Weis’ hands.

Currently, the board proposes broad policies while the superintendent suggests procedures for putting the education policy in place.

Weis, who like the board members is elected, said it appeared the board majority had backed off on what some see as attempts to limit his authority.

“So far the policies that they have come up with are livable,” Weis said. “They don’t really change much at all.”

But several policy changes, however, miffed board members Al Rosen and John McGarry, who sparred verbally with the other board members throughout the marathon session.

Under one of the proposals made Monday, board members would no longer need to get board approval if they wanted to attend conferences--on their $1,500 annual travel budgets--held by groups other than mainstream organizations such as the California School Boards Assn.

Such a policy, McGarry said, would allow board members to use the money to attend conferences sponsored by organizations that may not reflect the attitudes of Ventura County parents.

“Basically, a board member could go to something that the public might not like and the board would have already pre-approved it with this,” McGarry said.

The board’s majority also agreed to propose a change that would not require board members to notify the sponsors of teacher training workshops when panel members wanted to drop in on such sessions.

The board plans to continue discussing the revisions to its policies on Sept. 30 and expects to vote on the changes later this year.