3 Richland board members have cost thousands in legal fees. Here’s the breakdown so far | Opinion

Richland School Board member Rick Jansons should not have been cut off at a recent school board meeting as he attempted to find out how much money board members Audra Byrd, Kari Williams and Semi Bird have cost the school district in legal fees over the past year.

Board President Williams wanted to get through the agenda and told him he could speak at the end of the meeting, which he did. But he still felt like he was being shut down so at the next board meeting he used the time reserved for citizens to talk at the podium.

It was a sad, unprecedented move and indicates the level of dysfunction on the school board right now.

Fortunately for taxpayers, though, Jansons was able to get a few financial questions in and now he has some answers.

As suspected, it turns out the attorney costs brought on in the past year range in the thousands of dollars and Jansons still doesn’t have the full report.

So far, he said he has found out that the school district spent $8,800 to get advice from multiple outside attorneys over the state’s mask requirement, and $2,700 for an outside attorney to evaluate Richland School District Attorney Galt Pettett.

In addition, it cost the school district $24,900 in attorney fees over charges that Byrd, Williams and Bird broke the Washington state Open Meetings Act and $5,000 to settle the case.

Jansons is also interested in finding out the cost of hiring outside attorneys to investigate the superintendent and other school employees. All the concerns were unfounded, he said.

The Herald reported last month that the school district has refused to pay a $30,800 legal bill from a private attorney submitted last July to defend board members Byrd, Williams and Bird in a recall effort. It’s unclear how high those costs might be now.

When Jansons asked at the Feb. 28 school board meeting if those attorney fees were going to be discussed by the board any time soon, Williams told him that the situation is covered by attorney-client privilege and it would be illegal for them to discuss it openly.

Seriously? The school district has been sent a bill and that can’t be discussed in the open?

Attorney-client privilege typically covers the attorney side. Clients can waive that protection if they want to — and in this case, for transparency’s sake, they should.

Altogether, legal fees that we know of so far have cost the Richland School District $72,200.

What’s ironic is that Byrd, Williams and Bird now claim they never broke the law when they voted last year to make masks optional.

If that’s true, why did they spend so much time and money trying to find a legal way around the state mask mandate?

Ever since the recall effort against Byrd, Williams and Bird has started to gain steam, emotions are again running hot at school board meetings and the divide in the community is growing wider.

And now Byrd has added to the drama by suggesting a succession plan for the school district, which could be code for finding a way to get rid of Richland School Superintendent Shelley Redinger.

Byrd said she wants a deputy superintendent hired before summer.

How much do you think that will cost the school district?

The last Richland School District deputy superintendent retired Jan. 31 and reportedly made nearly $199,000. School leaders were conscientious about not filling that position in order to keep administrative costs lower and use that money for students.

Redinger made the safe and wise decision to close school for two days after Byrd, Williams and Bird made the unexpected decision to make masks optional in defiance of Gov. Jay Inslee’s emergency COVID orders.

If Redinger had not closed schools, there could have been children waiting at street corners for buses that never came. That alone is a risk that the school district couldn’t afford to take. The school district also was at risk of losing state funding if it had defied the mask mandate.

Byrd, Williams and Bird were reckless to think they could make masks optional and at the same time force teachers and other school district employees to also go against the law.

Redinger did her job. She also has a contract. Yet it appears Byrd might be trying to fire her which would result, no doubt, in more legal costs to the district.

The Richland School District has spent way too much on attorneys already, and Jansons was right to request a breakdown of those costs so far. Sadly, if Byrd has her way implementing a succession plan, even more money could be wasted.