The Lee County Board of Education voted Wednesday to make its interim attorney a permanent hire.

The board dispensed with planned interviews and instead voted unanimously to enter negotiations to hire Robert Dodig, one of three applicants for school board attorney.

Dodig has served as interim board attorney since the resignation of Kathy Dupuy-Bruno, who left that position Jan. 23 but was paid through March 13.

Dupuy-Bruno took a similar job in Broward County, the state’s second-largest school district. Lee County is the eighth-largest.

Dodig most recently served as assistant school board attorney for human resources.

Board member Debbie Jordan expressed some dismay that the process the board had outlined would not be followed. It was in the one-on-one interviews that some board members changed their minds on whom to hire last time, she said. But Jordan ultimately joined the rest of the board in voting to hire Dodig.

The board attorney is a role contracted separately with the school board. Dupuy-Bruno was hired in April 2020 at a base salary of $175,000.

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