- April 25, 2024
-
-
Loading
Loading
The Volusia County School Board has a new attorney.
Aaron Wolfe, an attorney with the Doran Sims Wolfe and Yoon firm, will be advising the School Board from this point forward, as announced during the board's workshop on Tuesday, Sept. 13. Wolfe is a partner of the same firm as Ted Doran, the previous attorney for the board, whom board members gave a low evaluation score at their last meeting.
At the start of the board's follow-up discussion at the workshop, School Board Chair Ruben Colon said that all of the board members had recently received an email from Doren's law firm announcing the change of attorney. The board proceeded to speak about expectations.
"We need to expect that our board attorney treats each of us equally, and that there's not pitting conversations going on — one with you and a different one with me about the same topic to get a different answer," Board member Anita Burnette said. "And I think we need to have a professional expectation of the relationship between the board attorney and the superintendent, because I think that was not always there before."
That evening, Burnette made two motions, both to terminate the legal services contract with cause.
“I’m grateful for Mr. Wolfe stepping in, and he’s been very helpful already today,” Burnette said. “It doesn’t address the issue that our legal representation failed to properly provide legal advice and appropriate direction with the contract compared to the policy.”
Her first motion died for lack of a second, and her second motion was seconded by School Board member Jamie Haynes, but failed 3-2.
Haynes agreed, and said that a school board attorney’s job is to keep the board out of trouble, a job in which Doran failed at doing because the board failed to follow its own policy. She also felt their attorney should not be the one to draft the legal services contract.
With Wolfe now advising te board, Colon said there was an opportunity to “reset.” Wolfe and Doran are two different people, and he saw his representation as an opportunity to start over with expectations in place.
“I think we’re starting new and I think we’re all resetting at this point,” Colon said.
The board voted 4-1 to accept Doran’s evaluation as discussed at the previous board meeting. Cuthbert voted against.
In looking at the evaluation tool document the board created during the workshop, School Board member Carl Persis asked Wolfe to familiarize himself with the categories and if he had any questions about them, to contact the chair for clarification. He echoed comments made by Haynes regarding Wolfe's professionalism, saying that he has always answered board members' questions "in a very dignified way, and a very helpful way."
"That's all we want," Persis said. "We're not so bad, and I kind of like this — we're kind of like wiping the slate clean, starting over. We have almost two years left on this contract, so let's make it positive and productive for everyone here so that we all continue to just feel comfortable and that there's no friction."
This story was updated at 10:32 a.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 14, to include comments made during the board's meeting in the evening.
