Ethics complaint hits School Board president

The candidate running against Clark County School Board President Erin Cranor filed an ethics complaint against her Thursday for Cranor’s actions described in a lawsuit against the district and her, individually.

The lawsuit, filed by the district’s former health insurance negotiator, still rages on against the Clark County School District. The district, however, offered a $100,100 settlement, using taxpayer money to take Cranor and her personal assets off the table.

The complaint, lodged by Joe Spencer, calls for the Nevada Commission on Ethics to ascertain whether Cranor broke a state law for “failing to hold public office as a public trust; failing to avoid conflicts between public and private interests.”

The complaint follows a Review-Journal story last week revealing that the Clark County School District wrote and signed Cranor’s name to a $100,000 settlement check that freed her from a lawsuit — which threatened her personal assets — without School Board approval.

District spokeswoman Kirsten Searer said district officials didn’t inform board members about the payout — written Sept. 12 — or seek their approval because the district’s settlement check didn’t exceed $100,000. District regulation states that board approval is required if the “claimant’s award, total settlement or collective payments” exceeds $100,000.

But the total settlement of $100,100 — offered by the district in August — did exceed that regulation requirement by $100. The district simply issued a check for $100,000 and then had its outside legal counsel, Kolesar and Leatham, pay the remaining $100 to Business Benefits Inc.

Searer has said that Cranor and board members are declining to comment on the advice of district lawyers.

“As the opponent of Erin Cranor in the upcoming election and as a concerned parent in the Clark County School District, I cannot sit by and watch the flat-out shady and ridiculous behavior of Erin Cranor and the CCSD,” Spencer said Wednesday.

Business Benefits, the district’s former health insurance negotiator, filed its lawsuit against the district and Cranor as an individual in May 2014, claiming its contract was cut short and Cranor stepped outside her duties as a board member by demanding that the district kill the agreement “as soon as possible,” as shown in an October 2013 email from Cranor to Superintendent Pat Skorkowsky. Although Cranor is no longer a part of the case, the district is still embroiled in the lawsuit.

Searer said Wednesday that district officials didn’t show Cranor the $100,000 settlement check or ask permission to stamp her signature on it. District officials also didn’t discuss the conflict of interest in having Cranor’s settlement check bear her own signature, Searer said. The settlement uses taxpayer money to pull Cranor out from under a lawsuit that put her personal assets at risk.

Contact Trevon Milliard at tmilliard@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0279. Find him on Twitter: @TrevonMilliard.