Gilbert outsourced $21,000 in first month with Douglas School District, legality of contract questioned by trustees

In a heated meeting filled with arguments, accusations and yelling matches, the Douglas County School Board extensively discussed the charges incurred by the recently hired Reno-based attorney Joey Gilbert during his first month of employment.

According to invoices brought forward by Trustees Linda Gilkerson and Carey Kangas, Gilbert has charged the board approximately $35,000 during his first month, far exceeding his agreed upon $7,500 per month retainer.

However, some members of the board took great issue with what — and who — the invoices were for.

Within the invoices, which ranged from thousands of dollars worth of answering emails and phone calls with Trustee David Burns, to researching statutes and watching meetings, it was revealed that over $21,000 of the $35,000 was billed directly to a woman named Kiera Sears, according to Kangas.

Several members did not even know who Sears was prior to the Sept. 12 meeting, when they were reviewing the bill for tens of thousands of dollars.

Sears is employed by Gilbert's law firm, and appears to have taken charge of the vast majority of researching, policy drafting and billing during the month.

According to Kangas, Sears was mentioned 50 times within the invoices, while Gilbert was mentioned only 39 times by comparison.

Also of note, Burns was referenced 13 times, with each interaction with Gilbert costing hundreds to thousands of dollars in charges.

Gilkerson pointed out that Sears has been billing the district at $325 per hour — standard for a licensed lawyer, which Sears is not.

While Sears has a law degree, she does not hold a current license to practice law in Nevada, according to Gilkerson, and should not have been charged at the same rate.

“I believe the amount she charges is fair,” Gilbert said.

Trustee Tony Magnotta stated the board hired Joey Gilbert, and Magnotta had specifically asked Gilbert during his interview if by hiring him the board would be providing an “open checkbook to outsource to 800 other lawyers” and bill the district for it, which Gilbert assured him would not occur.

“You hired my firm,” Gilbert clarified. “Keira works for my law firm.”

One item stuck out to Gilkerson: Sears charged the district thousands of dollars in researching Open Meeting Law, which according to Gilkerson, should never have been necessary.

“Shouldn’t they know that?” Gilkerson asked.

Sears said Gilbert asked her to research the OML statutes due to complaints that have come in against the board.

“And he can’t do that himself?” Gilkerson asked.

Kangas agreed, stating, “It seems like you’re charging us to educate yourselves.”

Gilkerson further alleged the invoices were illegal for a number of reasons.

First, she argued that no one authorized Burns to discuss anything with Gilbert, and instead should have been directing any questions regarding policy to Superintendent Keith Lewis.

Sears argued that as a trustee, Burns has every right to seek out counsel regarding policy.

Secondly, Gilkerson argued that Gilbert’s contract was never approved of or voted on by the board. In fact, many board members never even had a chance to see the contract in its final form.

She said that during a closed August meeting, the contract was presented not to the board to sign, but to only four members: President Susan Jansen, Vice President Doug Englekirk, Burns, and Katherine Dickerson.

In addition, Gilkerson said, on the signature page the line for Lewis to sign was intentionally removed, which violates policy.

According to Gilkerson, by their own policy either the Superintendent or an approved district financial officer must approve the contract before it can be finalized.

Sears argued that Lewis was not allowed to sign, but that he did approve of the contract because he was sent an email that he did not object to.

Lewis, who was quiet for most of the discussions, responded to this claim: “I did object, Keira, and nothing has been done about it.”

Later, Lewis added that the communication between Gilbert’s firm and the Superintendents office has been “almost zero” following Gilbert's claim that his office had been working closely with the Superintendent's office.

“I’m very frustrated that the Superintendent('s office) is being kept out of communications and meetings,” Lewis said. “Intentional or not, for over a month I’ve not received communication.”

Lewis did not state specifically what he'd objected to in the contract, but it was brought up that Gilbert intentionally changed in the contract so that he would be reporting directly to the board, and not to the superintendent unlike the precedent set by both his predecessors and the majority of other school board attorneys.

“The board is who hired me,” Gilbert said.

Kangas agreed that he did not believe Gilbert has a valid contract: “This was either done on purpose or it was done by mistake."

Kangas asked whether or not he was correct, and Gilbert immediately turned to confer with Sears.

“Excuse me, but I asked Mr. Gilbert,” Kangas said.

Gilbert explained that Sears is the one who helped to draft the contract, and that “no material changes” were made.

Gilkerson stated she would like to see the contract renegotiated, and said that since the contract is not valid, neither are the invoices, to a round of applause from the audience members.

In response to the allegations and questions as to “What the board is actually paying for”, Gilbert accused Gilkerson of having said that the board is broken, and that she wanted to go to the Board of Education with her complaint.

“That was a private conversation in closed session, Mr. Gilbert,” Gilkerson said.

“You’ve said it to everyone here that we have a mess that we have to clean up,” Gilbert said. “This is me trying to figure out what’s gone awry here.”

Despite some trustees asking for Gilbert’s contract to be reviewed and his expenses placed on pause until the contract could be negotiated properly, Jansen, Englekirk, Burns and Dickerson won the vote to approve his expenses.

This is a developing story and more information from the meeting will be released in other stories.