{"id":17595,"date":"2025-10-28T12:16:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-28T12:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/17595\/"},"modified":"2025-10-28T12:16:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T12:16:07","slug":"southern-lehigh-school-board-chooses-new-attorneys-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/17595\/","title":{"rendered":"Southern Lehigh School Board chooses new attorneys"},"content":{"rendered":"

The law firm that served as school board attorney while the Southern Lehigh School District navigated an investigation of harassment, discrimination and whistleblower complaints<\/a> has now been replaced \u2014 at its request.<\/p>\n

KingSpry notified the district last month that it would end its board solicitor services come November, and Monday night the school board approved a switch to Wisler Pearlstine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it was in everyone\u2019s best interest,\u201d John E. Freund, III, a founding member of KingSpry, told The Morning Call after the meeting concluded.<\/p>\n

The move comes after some board members questioned Freund\u2019s representation during the complaint investigations and subsequent negotiations with former Superintendent Michael Mahon over his exit.<\/p>\n

Superintendent Karen Trinkle thanked KingSpry for its services during her remarks at the meeting opening, saying, \u201cWe thank attorney Freund and his team for partnering with us in the last few years, and we\u2019re appreciative of the relationship and the guidance you\u2019ve provided us during that time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most recently, KingSpry has represented the board as it handled complaints brought by former human resources director Ethan Ake-Little against former Superintendent Michael Mahon and the school board.<\/p>\n

Between Jan.1, 2024, and Sept. 1, 2025, a Morning Call analysis shows the district incurred nearly $345,000 in legal bills, with typical district legal needs such as special education litigation, tax or lease matters, contracts or training and policy reviews making up about 42% of the total.<\/p>\n

The remaining nearly 60% of the district\u2019s legal bills in that 20-month period fall into a miscellaneous category that includes special counsel investigations and other activities that appear likely related to Ake-Little\u2019s complaints. \t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The legal bills analyzed were split between several firms: $232,921 to KingSpry, the school board solicitor; $57,112 to Sweet, Stevens, Katz & Williams; $31,013 to Wisler Pearlstine; $17,050 to Fox Rothschild; and $6,773 to Fitzpatrick, Lentz & Bubba.<\/p>\n

Of the KingSpry bills, $80,279 relates to special education litigation, $16,418 covers tax assessments and leases, $7,050 is labeled contracts or training and $7,605 is for policy work.<\/p>\n

Another $25,713 of the KingSpry bills stem from Right-to-Know requests, including some from The Morning Call, leaving $95,854 in miscellaneous charges that include board communication and meeting preparation, correspondence with Ake-Little, Mahon and Trinkle, and attendance at executive sessions.<\/p>\n

Mahon was placed on administrative leave in February and in July reached a nearly $250,000 separation agreement<\/a> with the district that includes $25,000 in attorney\u2019s fees and $110,000 to settle \u201cmutual claims against each other that could lead to litigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ake-Little was suspended in mid-June and in August reached a $215,000 settlement<\/a> that included a mutual release of claims but did not include payment of Ake-Little\u2019s attorney\u2019s fees.<\/p>\n

Billing delays mean work done on these July and August settlements might not be captured in the analyzed invoices. The most recent invoices released by KingSpry in The Morning Call\u2019s Right-to-Know request cover work done through the end of June.<\/p>\n

On Monday, the Southern Lehigh School Board also approved a resolution enabling KingSpry to act as special counsel<\/a>, which Trinkle said would enable the resolution of ongoing matters.<\/p>\n

District investigations continue<\/p>\n

One of Wisler Pearlstine\u2019s first orders of business for Southern Lehigh will be an analysis of district employee compensation in response to concerns of gender bias in pay.<\/p>\n

Board member and former board president Emily Gehman raised concerns during the Oct. 13 board meeting, saying she\u2019s observed \u201cpatterns of disparity between female and male counterparts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gehman called out differences in starting salaries granted to the incoming human resources director, Darbe DeHaven, versus the two men previously in that position.<\/p>\n

DeHaven\u2019s employee agreement<\/a> includes a starting salary of $125,000. Ake-Little started as human resources director in 2023<\/a> with an initial salary of $130,600.\n<\/p>\n

Gehman also cited the treatment of instructional assistants and secretarial staff in contract negotiations as examples of the district undervaluing female staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m talking about systemic things that I have raised over and over again about the disparity between men and women in this district,\u201d Gehman said.<\/p>\n

Wisler Pearlstine previously provided special counsel services to investigate a retaliation claim Ake-Little filed alleging continued mistreatment from Mahon and board members following his initial harassment and discrimination claim.<\/p>\n

The fee agreement approved for Montgomery County-based Wisler Pearlstine<\/a> includes $1,750 a month for \u201cbasic services\u201d defined as attending board meetings and advising on agendas, Pennsylvania Ethics Act inquiries and school law updates. Hourly rates are listed for additional services. The agreement went into effect immediately and runs through June 30, 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The law firm that served as school board attorney while the Southern Lehigh School District navigated an investigation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,227,182,139,432],"class_list":{"0":"post-17595","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news","11":"tag-education","12":"tag-local-news","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-top-stories-tmc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17595"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17595\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}