Lakewood school board hands lawyer 35 percent raise for hourly work

Stacey Barchenger | Asbury Park Press

Show Caption Hide Caption Lakewood school lawyer's salary tops state, national officials Lakewood's school district, which was $28 million short last year, pays its lawyer more than the U.S. secretary of education.

LAKEWOOD - The public schools' $600,000-a-year attorney, who earns four times as much as the state education commissioner, is getting a pay raise.

The cash-strapped district will pay Michael Inzelbuch $125 more per hour for work he does on court cases on behalf of the 6,000-student school district, according to a resolution approved by the Lakewood Board of Education on Monday.

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For 2018-2019, Inzelbuch's hourly rate is $475, an increase of 35 percent over his hourly pay of $350 last school year.

Inzelbuch will also be paid a maximum $50,000-a-month retainer, as he was last year, of up to $600,000 annually. The new compensation package comes as the district faces a $28 million budget deficit.

BACKGROUND:

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“The board specifically finds that Mr. Inzelbuch’s knowledge-base and actual experience, including but not limited to litigation with public school law, special education matters and non-public school issues is unique and (of a) high quality," board member Heriberto Rodriguez said before the board's vote.

David Sciarra, executive director of the Education Law Center, a nonprofit group that advocates for public school districts, said the board and state had again failed Lakewood's students. Sciarra filed a complaint last year, ahead of the state attorney general's recent review of Inzelbuch's $600,000 retainer.

"Once again, the Lakewood board has let down its students by approving this outrageous ... contract," Sciarra said Tuesday. "What's even more shocking is state monitor David Shafter allowing this to go forward."

Rodriguez said the board conducted a "thorough review" of bids from other law firms seeking the job before choosing Inzelbuch. Three other bids were received, all proposing an hourly rate of $165 or $175 and a monthly retainer between $10,000 and $24,500 — well below Inzelbuch's bid. However, a four-person "evaluation committee" ranked Inzelbuch higher than the other firms.

Inzelbuch, who has not yet signed the new contract, could not be reached Tuesday to comment.

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Inzelbuch's contract has drawn criticism from public education advocates, who question the district's spending and the state's duty to oversee the struggling district's financial decisions. This year, the New Jersey Department of Education loaned the schools $28 million in taxpayer funds to keep them afloat and avoid drastic staff and program cuts.

While the Board of Education handed Inzelbuch a hefty raise, it also approved a 3 percent increase for teachers who are in the midst of contract negotiations.

The district has argued that hiring Inzelbuch has saved money. District figures show a $690,000 drop in legal services fees between the 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 school years.

One difference between those two years: Which team Inzelbuch was on.

In 2016-2017, Inzelbuch worked as a private attorney. He frequently sued the Lakewood school district on behalf of families with special education students and won, capitalizing on a legal provision that obligated the district to pay his fees — a total of $714,000.

In 2017-2018, Inzelbuch was no longer suing the schools, but instead working for them.

Still, his pay — which is four times more than state Commissioner of Education Lamont O. Repollet's salary and three times more than U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos' — often draws criticism of district spending. See more in the video at the top of this story.

It has also prompted a review by the New Jersey Attorney General's Office, which said in June that Inzelbuch's contract violated rules that prohibit advance payment for legal work.

During Monday's school board meeting, Inzelbuch asked state-appointed fiscal monitor Shafter if he approved the legal contract. Shafter said he did.

The monitor is tasked with overseeing financial decisions made by the school board and can veto board votes.

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In his most recent year on the district payroll, which ended June 30, Inzelbuch was paid a total of $620,000, records show.

That includes:

a retainer paid in $50,000 monthly payments for 10½ months, for a total of $529,000;

$65,000 in litigation and court costs at the $350 hourly rate; and

$26,000 in health benefits.

If Inzelbuch bills for as many court hours this year, based on his new hourly rate of $475, he will take home an additional $23,000. The new contract does not include health benefits, Inzelbuch said during the school board meeting. The board also agreed to pay paralegals $75 per hour.

Before the attorney general's review, Inzelbuch justified his $50,000 monthly earnings with a two-page invoice. In May, however, and in an effort to provide more details of his work, Inzelbuch's bill grew to 30 pages.

He previously provided a redacted copy to the Press, which does not include the number of hours worked. Instead it describes tasks performed, from spending time working on lawsuits and court cases to acting as the district's spokesman and reading news stories, or arranging a student incentive program with the township's minor league baseball team, the Lakewood BlueClaws.

Sciarra said many of Inzelbuch's tasks appear to violate a state regulation that directs school boards to prevent unnecessary use of lawyers for management decisions.

"Many, if not most, of the items listed in this bill appear to be routine decisions about management of the district, not legal matters," Sciarra said. "Also, the invoice fails to itemize the services for which the district is being billed, along with the time spent on the item. The invoice is wholly deficient."

Early this year, Inzelbuch emerged as the chief lobbyist working to convince the state the district needed a financial bailout it would not have to repay. Lakewood's schools are perennially short on cash, a problem district leaders blame on the New Jersey's education funding formula.

While the state funding formula allocates money based on public school enrollment, state law also requires public school districts to cover costs of services like transportation and special education for private school students.

In Lakewood, an estimated 33,000 students get private education, mostly at Orthodox Jewish schools, yet only 6,000 are enrolled in public schools. Those numbers, coupled with the state's funding formula, lead to an imbalance.

Ultimately, however, state officials cited a lack of cooperation from Lakewood district leaders and offered the schools a $28 million loan to balance their books.

Nonetheless, some residents and advocates question how Lakewood is spending the money it does receive, pointing to reports of discrimination in special education placements, and Inzelbuch's salary.

Stacey Barchenger: @sbarchenger; 732-427-0114; sbarchenger@gannettnj.com