Washoe school board rejects Gilbert’s application to fill seat

The Washoe County School District’s Board of Trustees on Tuesday rejected a bid by Reno attorney and former gubernatorial candidate Joey Gilbert to fill an open seat.

Gilbert failed to garner enough points from board members because he did not include a resume as part of his application, according to trustees.

Trustee Beth Smith said the board’s invitation to apply required that interested candidates submit two things with their application. A majority of the seven candidates who applied submitted both a cover letter and a resume.

Two of the candidates – Gilbert and John Reyes – only submitted a cover letter, according to documents uploaded with the meeting agenda.

“Ours is a straightforward and clear process,” Smith said. “It’s fair, and expecting candidates to submit the required materials is a basic test of candidacy.”

But Paul White, a spokesperson for Gilbert, said the board was lying and that there was no requirement that a resume had to be turned in with the application.

Gilbert did turn in a resume before the voting was done, but not every trustee had a copy, according to White.

“It’s just a mess,” White said.

The district of approximately 60,000 students saw an opening on its board after the current president, Angie Taylor, won her election to the state Assembly and vacated her seat.

In comments ahead of the vote, Gilbert called attention to problems in Washoe County, including chronic absenteeism and violence in schools.

“If we were to run this like a business – which is what should be done – with the children’s best interest in mind, we would have to give the entire board an enema,” he said. “Honestly, as tough as that sounds. We would have to start with a clean slate.”

Trustee Jeff Church said that 70 percent of the emails that the board received from the public expressed support for Gilbert to fill the seat, while the remaining 30 percent were in support of appointing Reno’s director of parking and code enforcement, Alex Woodley.

Gilbert – who lost the Republican nomination for governor in the primary election earlier this year to Sheriff Joe Lombardo – has been one of the loudest voices alleging voter fraud in the 2020 and 2022 elections, going so far as to pay $200,000 for a recount in his race against Lombardo. His lawsuit over the primary election results was rejected, and he was later ordered to pay attorneys fees to Lombardo.

On Tuesday, the Washoe board judged its applicants with a rubric that scored each candidate on several criteria, including how complete and professional their resume and cover letters were and how well each candidate articulated the skills and experience they would bring to the board.

The board ultimately voted to advance the three candidates who received the most points after the grading: Alex Woodley, Meghan Beyer and Kellie Crosby-Sturtz.

Ahead of the vote, Trustee Joseph Rodriguez said he could not vote for candidates who did not fully complete their application.

“I’ve said this before. If you don’t do your homework, you don’t get a grade,” Rodriguez said.

Contact Lorraine Longhi at 702-387-5298 or llonghi@reviewjournal.com. Follow her at @lolonghi on Twitter.