Edinburg school board to discuss possible settlement proposals in payroll fiasco

Edinburg school board trustees will discuss Tuesday advice from legal counsel and possible settlement proposals related to Zelda Martinez and Margarita Oyervides, directors whom a Texas Education Agency hearing officer sided with earlier this month in a recommendation related to an extra payment dispute.

The board may also take action on the women.

In 2021, Martinez and Oyervides worked a significant amount of extra hours responding to a payroll fiasco caused by a system switch.

The district paid them extra money for that extra work: $40,716.44 for Martinez and $17,031.74 for Oyervides.

District administration said in hearings last month that those payments weren’t discovered until late 2022, after which trustees voted 5-1 to propose Martinez and Oyervides for termination this January.

Martinez and Oyervides, who respectively served as the district’s salaried payroll and personnel directors in 2021, have been on administrative leave since December.

The board installed replacements for their positions in March.

In those hearings, Martinez and Oyervides testified that they did nothing wrong responding to the payroll fiasco and insisted that they acted in the district’s best interests.

District administrators, however, testified that those payments should not have been made because they were never explicitly authorized in writing.

A TEA hearing officer ultimately sided with the directors stoutly, commending their efforts, describing hazy district policy related to extra payments and critiquing parts of the district’s reaction to the situation. He recommended they be reinstated and made whole.

Superintendent Mario Salinas said last month he felt the women had essentially committed theft, and told The Monitor earlier this month that despite the state recommendation he would still favor termination — though the decision on what happens next ultimately lies with the board.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: