Molly Janczyk re: Confusion on legal fees

From Molly Janczyk to Joyce Baldwin and others, December 16, 2007
Subject: Joyce: Private: Confusions on legal fees

All,

Can someone please explain to me why the STRS Legal Team cannot represent staff members who acted within the confines of all legal and ethical policies of STRS and are charged with a suit or any legal issues. If terminated, then obtaining their own counsel would, I hope, be mandatory at their personal cost.

Please list circumstances where Neville and Staff are not qualified to represent STRS employees. WHY is there this debate regarding paying outside legal counsel for staff?

If there are such circumstances where STRS Legal Team cannot represent staff on charges, they would indeed be special would they not and therefore need to be presented to the Board for review just as disability cases, special pension circumstances, etc.

As educators , we had/have union legal counsel available to us-nothing more. Why should staff who work for us have better representation than its membership?

What is the problem here, specifically? What would staff be worried about? They seem highly professional working within standards set. I don't ever recall ever worrying about suits or charges since I did my job within its confines legally and ethically with plenty of room for creative thinking and planning and executing.

I am naively confused. Is our legal team not prepared or able to represent staff?

What are the good business practices with other pension systems?

What are the good business practices with other businesses?

Do any other companies, systems pay for outside counsel when a legal team is on site?

Molly J.