BOARD OVERTURNS ZENDEJAS ON SOLIS DEMOTION; FORMER VMHS PRINCIPAL PREVAILS ON LEVEL 3 GRIEVANCE

By Juan Montoya

In a clear rejection of her management style, a majority of the board present at Tuesday's monthly meeting of the of the Brownsville Independent School District sided with former Veterans Memorial High School principal Maria E. Solis on her Level 3 Grievance.

The vote was 5-0, with trustee Cowen abstaining. Trustees Dr. Sylvia Atkinson, Minerva Peña, Laura Perez-Reyes, Cesar Lopez, and Joe Rodriguez – the latter albeit grudgingly – voted to return her to her former level. Carlos Elizondo was absent.

The board instructed Superintendent Esperanza Zendejas to return her to her pay level and to a similar position she held before.

Once a grievance gets to Level 3, it means that the employee has exhausted all avenues for relief and the board decides the outcome of the complaint. If the board had denied her grievance, it opened the door to litigation in the local courts. In a previous meeting, the administration had suggested that the board hire an attorney to sit on the Level 3 meeting and make recommendations for their consideration.The grievance involved allegations that two board members had meddling in the purchasing and staffing at a school. A majority of the board turned Zendejas' proposal down.

Solis claimed to have been approached by board members Joe Rodriguez, Carlos Elizondo and Superintendent Esperanza Zendejas on a number of issues. Among these were:

1, the illegal hiring of coaches at the school
2. the hiring of Elizondo's wife (a counselor)
3. Forcing VMHS coaches to purchase athletic equipment from vendors associated with Rodriguez, himself a vendor for BFN, an athletic equipment vendor
4. Forcing VMHS principal Solis to contract with Joe Rodriguez's preferred vendors for graduation products (rings). Sources say that Rodriguez was pushing for the school to purchase graduation products (rings) from Herff Jones, the same vendor on the agenda who wants to donate 28 rings to Porter High School. The same sources say that Rodriguez told Solis that "You need to give business to these people. They take care of us."

Our sources at the BISD say that Solis, the former principal at Veterans Memorial High School, was a rising star in the district until she started getting personal requests from certain board members for hiring and purchases at the school. Then, out of nowhere, she was transferred to be the principal at Lucio Middle School, a clear demotion.

There was another wrinkle here. Solis' brother, Jorge Lerma, is a lieutenant at the Brownsville Fire Dept. Lately, we have heard that Elizondo is exerting pressure on Lerma and making his life difficult. Remember we told you about the city personnel policy that says that city employees cannot hold elected positions in local school boards because of a possible conflict of interest?

Section 702: Political Activity
"B. Specifically, City Employees may not engage in the following activities:
4. Hold an elective City office or hold an elective or appointive office in any other jurisdiction where service would constitute a direct conflict of interest with City employment, with or without remuneration. Upon assuming such office, an Employee shall resign or shall be dismissed for cause upon failure to do so."

Conveniently, Elizondo did not attend the BISD meeting or the city commission meeting Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the BISD rumor mill was working overtime with suggestions that board counsel had been directed to devise an exit strategy for Zendejas, who was given a raise and her contract extended before the Novemeber 2016 board elections.

Zendejas has been seen as doing the bidding for Rodriguez and Elizondo and the other members who comprise the majority of the board. However, the rejection of her actions in the Solis case indicates that other board members are starting to shy away from the Rodriguez-Elizondo core and aligning themselves with a new majority.