Keller school board lawyer to represent Tarrant district clerk in removal suit
The Tarrant County Commissioners Court on Tuesday approved the hiring of a lawyer at the center of the Keller ISD split proposal controversy to defend District Clerk Tom Wilder in a lawsuit seeking his removal from office.
The court voted 4-1 to hire Tim Davis of the Fort Worth law firm Jackson Walker to represent Wilder in a petition calling for his removal on allegations he mishandled an Arlington man’s custody case in a Tarrant County family court. No one on the court commented on the issue before taking the vote.
Democrat Alisa Simmons of Arlington was the sole vote against hiring Davis. She did not immediately respond to a request for comment on her vote.
Davis, who declined to comment, has represented the Keller school board trustees as a client distinct from the school district since June 2022. His work included providing legal counsel during the failed proposal to split Keller ISD earlier this year.
Wilder told the Star-Telegram that this and other lawsuits are “without merit, and we vigorously intend to defend them.”
Keller school board trustees violated the Texas Open Meetings Act when they discussed the plan in private talks before it was made known to the public, according to lawsuits seeking the removal of the trustees from office.
Five Tarrant County residents signed up to speak to the commissioners about the proposal to hire Davis, but only three were present at Tuesday’s meeting.
Sandra Cooley, of Keller, said she opposed hiring Davis because “he is still mired in the poo and stink” of the failed proposal to split Keller ISD earlier this year.
Citing Davis’ $172,000 invoice for his services during the attempt to split the district, Cooley said that Keller ISD taxpayers have been “forced to pick up Tim’s tab” for his work representing the school board’s “ridiculous culture wars.”
Davis and his associates at Jackson Walker and his previous firm Cantey Hanger have billed Keller ISD over $500,000 for work representing the school board trustees over the last three years, according to invoices obtained through open records requests. The majority of the invoices have the descriptions of services redacted.
Barbara Brewer, also of Keller, called the funds spent on Davis’ counsel “money that should have gone to students in classrooms, not lawsuits and not a political agenda.”
“As taxpayers, we’re tired of seeing public money wasted,” she said. “We don’t want another dime going toward Mr. Davis or his law firm. Please make a fiscally conservative, responsible decision.”
Fort Worth resident Bishop Kirkland requested the commissioners list more accurate estimates of how much outside lawyers hired to represent county employees will cost, rather than “nickel-and-diming” taxpayers with such issues. The court order approving Davis’ hire approved up to $30,000 at $400 per hour.
“No one’s keeping a running total or telling us what the running total is,” Kirkland said. “We never know in the end how much we’re actually spending.”
The other two speakers who did not attend Tuesday’s meeting expressed disapproval of Davis’ hiring in the notes of their sign-up sheets for public comment.
The commissioners discussed the hiring in executive session before voting. The night before the meeting, they received an email from L. Brooks McKenzie, a developmental psychologist from Arlington, who is a plaintiff in the petition for Wilder’s removal.
In the email sent to the commissioners, county judge and several other recipients Monday evening, McKenzie, who is not a lawyer, said there are four criminal complaints filed against Wilder and that the county would be “complicit with the crimes” of which he has been accused.
McKenzie accused Wilder of being in violation of his oath of office and threatened to file criminal charges against the commissioners and petitions for their removal from office if they approved hiring Davis to represent him.
McKenzie also questioned the amount of funding budgeted for hiring Davis, calling a maximum of $30,000 an “idealistic estimate” and “ludicrous.” The crimes Wilder has been accused of are “serious,” McKenzie wrote, adding that he expects them to result in Wilder’s resignation, “but more likely an indictment.”
McKenzie’s email also mentions another petition for Wilder’s removal that was recently filed in a Tarrant County district court. On Monday, Southlake resident Conghua Yan accused Wilder of purging documents in an ongoing family court case, an act that “intentionally destroyed, concealed, removed, or otherwise impaired the verity, legibility, or availability of a governmental record,” the petition states.
This second petition for Wilder’s removal and an accompanying criminal complaint will make the legal bill for defending him higher than the county’s estimate, McKenzie wrote.
McKenzie, a Republican precinct chair in Tarrant County, told the Star-Telegram he is trying to “clean up” corruption in his own party.
This story was originally published August 5, 2025 at 4:40 PM.
