In an unsurprising move on August 20, 2015, the Montgomery County Board of Education voted to allocate $625,000 for upcoming special education legal fees to be paid to their outside counsel.
Despite the fact that MCPS employs multiple lawyers on staff, apparently they don't consider any of them qualified enough to undertake the distasteful work of fighting families who are seeking services for their children with disabilities.
Parents or guardians of students with disabilities should be aware that the latest tactic by MCPS outside counsel is to subpoena the student themselves to the due process hearing.
Not satisfied with the allocation of over a half million dollars to fight families, instead of actually providing needed services to children, the Board of Education then received the "Legal Fees Report" showing FY2015 year-to-date special education legal expenses of $244,000. Despite dissembling by Acting Superintendent Larry Bowers upon questioning by a board member, the facts remain that the year-to-date total of $244,624 is $49,364 (25.3 percent) more than the same period in the previous year.
Should $625,000 be spent on a lawyer that bills the taxpayers $6,000 a day? or should that money be allocated to provide direct special education services to children that need them?
Contact the chairman of the County Council Education Committee, Craig Rice, at Councilmember.Rice@montgomerycountymd.gov and let him know what YOU think.
The outside lawyer is only hired when parents hire lawyer. If parents go out on their own then they just use in Housr lawyers
ReplyDeletePlease cite your source for this information. We have not seen this happen.
Delete@ A.J. Campbell: Are you implying that if parents do not hire their own attorney (which is quite inadvisable) that MCPS will only use their in-house attorneys, folks such as Zvi Greisman, who’s been taking on parents of special needs children for decades? How is that fair… parents, with no legal counsel or little legal knowledge going toe to toe with a highly experienced education attorney in an adversary role? By the way, make sure you record EVERY meeting… when MCPS takes meeting minutes, things can and are often changed, re-interpreted, or just plain misrepresented.
DeleteTo be clear, here is an actual case we have observed. A student's educational plan is up for review. The student is an orphan and homeless. The student has no private legal representation. MCPS hires Jeffrey Krew at $6,000 a day to fight this child. This is not fiction. This is a real case. MCPS gets their way and knocks the student from services. Guess where student is today? In the criminal justice system.
Delete$6,000 a day attorney "wins" another one for the Board of Education. What kind of humans are happy with this result? And, should those types of humans be within 20 miles of children, ever?
Ms. Campbell, what you are espousing is simply NOT true. If parents file for "stay-put," ask for mediation or any number of other "challenges" to MCPS on their "findings" concerning your child (e.g. placement, coding, etc.), MCPS will and usually does, hire an out-sourced attorney, such as Jeffrey Krew. This happened to us.
ReplyDeleteAccompanied with a duplicate copy of the subpoena we had already been served by the court, Krew directly sent to our home (opposing parents in a proceeding) a request to directly submit the subpoena'd items DIRECTLY TO HIS OFFICE ASAP (without going through our lawyer). For parents not in close contact with their own lawyer or unfamiliar with legal practices, the duplicate copy of the court subpoena enclosed with his request to tender the subpoenaed items to him directly could give the appearance of court sanctioning that a parent should comply with Krew's request to send all the subpoena'd items to him without going through your own counsel first. Do others find it uplifting to financially support tactics like sucker punching all the special needs parent who don't have too many financial and other demands on them already with our own taxpayer money? Very upstanding legal practices indeed. Also, an Administrative Law Judge's ruling based on technical or facts can be appealed, but a ruling based on any plausable character attack on the parents CANNOT BE APPEALED as I understand it. So is an ALA more likely to rule on character question or technical issue if they prefer not to be embarrased by an appeal? If attacking the parents' characters makes further appeals much more difficult and an amenable judge ruling against them more likely, isn't it so much more ethical to attack the characters of the parents than actually address the real issue of the special needs' students' special needs? Yes, staff and the board members must be so proud of their affiliation with and ongoing financial support for such an upstanding, professional, ethical attorney who enriches the lives of their constituents.
ReplyDeleteYou are so right on regarding the personal attacks on the parents and the distracting arguments rather than addressing the real issues. The County must address such a shameful system that allows, no encourages, this corrupted process.
Delete@Anonymous September 4, 2015 at 9:52 AM, One of the many tactics used on us was an "anonymous" call to child protective services from our child's school. We soon found out that it was our child's school counselor acting partly at the behest of the vice principal. CPS immediately ruled out any issues at home. We did not let tactics like this stop us... Within six months of that and after clearly demonstrating bias and harassment by our child's counselor, she was removed as our child's counselor and forbidden to have any contact with our child per an agreement signed between us (parents) and MCPS. We never gave up and ultimately prevailed. Our child is now an honors student and is college bound. If MCPS had had their way (initially with Mr. Krew's help), our child would have been another statistic. NEVER GIVE UP.
DeleteNice to hear such inspiring words as the due process hearing is so traumatic, costly and caustic. The odds are against the parents. I do feel that the staff are "forced" into pushing MCPS's position whether or not the child's best interest is the issue. In fact, the standard is not the best interest of the child but what is deemed appropriate by MCPS. Quite a difference!
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