HCC board hired lawyer without vote

2015-12-15T14:05:53-06:00

By Benjamin Wermund Houston Chronicle Originally published Dec. 14, 2015 As conflict roiled the upper reaches of Houston Community College early last year, the institution's board chairman, Neeta Sane, told her fellow trustees during a closed-door session that they needed to hire an outside lawyer to negotiate a contract for an incoming chancellor. The attorney, Vidal Martinez, would come to do much more and earn a total of $200,463 in legal fees working both for the board and, later, HCC's administration - though no vote or discussion of Sane's decision to hire him ever took place in public. In addition to [...]