BALTAZAR SALAZAR: REAPING THE UNJUST REWARDS AT BISD

By Juan Montoya
What do you give a man whose law firm came in dead last in the rankings for legal counsel at the Brownsville Independent School District?
The job, of course.
And even if Baltazar Salazar's vita didn't include education law or special needs expertise, a majority of the BISD board opted to reward his shortcomings with a nice $20,000 a month gig. This past meeting the rewards were upped a notch to a three-year extension of his contract, an unheard of occurrence from board members, some of who will see their terms end before that period is up.
There is no guarantee, of course, that a future board will not serve him his 30-day notice and give him his walking papers. But for now, Salazar – a mediocre legal talent at best – is reaping the unjust rewards of a friendly board majority.

And to add salt to the wound, the board was presented with a $13,000 invoice for legal services from  Thompson and Horton, the firm that was fired when Salazar was brought on board. A public information request last month had yielded only a $350 bill from that firm. Things, apparently, are adding up fast.
That referrals to the old  BISD law firm from Salazar indicates that the two board members who voted against his  hiring – Lucy Longoria and Catalina Presas-Garcia – may have been right when they said that his law firm did not ave the necessary background to deal with the issues that have plagued the district, namely the due-process cases for students with special needs.
The number of due-process cases we're getting indicates that the district may not be meting the needs of that sector of the student body. The fact that the district had to go to the BISD's former law firm to handle these cases points to the deficiency of legal counsel to handle these matters.
Salazar's entry into the morass that BISD legal entanglement has become was inauspicious. Even before he had gotten the consent of the board, he had referred the HealthSmart files to a McAllen firm. This indiscretion did  not go unnoticed by board members who were told of the referral after it was a done deal. When Salazar found out that the cat was out of the bag, he lashed at the two board members saying they were interfering with legal matters and sought to chastise them for inquiring into the matter. Obviously used to dealing in the muck of things, he then launched into an unseemly attack against trustee Presas-Garcia going as far as accusing her in open court of sexual harassment.
But what is there to complain about? We knew from the get-go that we were getting cheap goods when the district's board majority bought into the Salazar package.
Of the eight law firms which submitted a reply for the Request For Qualifications to the district, Salazar and his firm firm failed to provide their qualifications for 17 of the 51 categories of basic legal services listed by the district. For example, they "Did Not Disclose" their qualifications on:
1. Competitive bidding
2. Copyright Issues
3. Election Law advice
4. Employee Health Insurance Matters
5. Federal Voters Right Advice
6. Fiber Optic Communications System
7. Freedom of Religion Issues
8. Governmental Tort Claims
9. Intergovernmental Agreements
10. Intergovernmental Relations
11. Liability for Asbestos
12. Preventive Law
13. Public Utility Commission
14. State Whistle Blower Act Compliance
15. Texas Teacher Retirement System
16. University Interscholastic League
17. Utility Law Regulation
We should add Special Needs litigation to this list. At this rate, the legal fees generated by Salazar's performance (or lack thereof) will quickly mount and we will be back to the days when the BISD fund balance was used as a personal ATM machine by lawyers, consultants and litigants filing these cases.