I didn’t attend the McHenry County Mental Health Board Tuesday night, but someone who was present tells me there was considerable attention given to attorney Frank Gosser’s bill.
At the 708 Board Finance Committee on May 16th, new member Rob Routzahn, a former Crystal Lake Grade School Board member, said,
“The only bill I want to see every month is Frank Gosser’s, the attorney’s.”
Here’ is the bill Gosser submitted on May 17th:
The 708 Board will hold a retreat staring this afternoon at 4 at its Crystal Lake office.
40 hours for $10,000 in one month.
I wonder what amount MCC paid Francis Gosser in the last fiscal year?
Francis X. Gosser
Attorney at Law
105 Van Buren Street
Woodstock, IL 60098
Business/Commercial
Real Property
Estate Law
Debt Collection/Creditor Rights
Clearly ,there is little awareness that are taxpayer dollars are not being monitored and are yet a source of unlimited funds for this guy.
A 10 hour block of time billed?
Last year he made over 292,000 off the Mental Health Board and he’s right on track to do the same this year and he is a consultant.
But, despite how outrageous it is, they paid him anyway, right?
Frank engages in what’s known as “block billing.”
Block billing is the practice of lumping several time entries into one, rather than having an individual time entry for each task performed.
This is frowned upon in the legal community because there is no way to verify whether the time he spent on each task was reasonable.
For example, for the April 23 entry, we have to take his word for it that he busted his butt every second of that ten hour block, worked on no other matters, and performed each task efficiently.
That may well be the case, but there is simply no way to evaluate it from the billing he has provided.
For a discussion of why block billing generally leads to gross overbilling, see http://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/block-billing-by-law-firms-costs-clients-91585/
Also, a minimum time billing increment of 0.25 hours?
Wow. Local custom is 0.1.
Having a high minimum time increment that you bill at inflates the bill drastically e.g. a 30 second phone call has to be billed for 15 minutes of time.
Are you commentators saying that attorneys are crooks?
Wow.
I am shocked.
Who knew?
I am at a loss to explaining why this guy is not exposed for his actions and abuse of tax payer money.
I am at a loss to explain why this board does not fire him?
Are they afraid of him?
If this board and agency is in such disarray that it can’t even deal with what is in front of them and that is obviously wrong.
The board, despite its new members don’t have the capabilities to fight the powers of Frank and Todd Shroll and therefore is but another neutered Board which is insufficient to be trustees of taxpayer money.
This just tells me that the Mental Health Board should be closed and further waste avoided.
mattmac is exactly right.
In our business (insurance claims) we require itemized bills so we can review what was done and question and reduce if needed. Also, billing is done in .1 hour increments.
We used a couple of firms who block billed and refused to change.
Shortly thereafter, they were no longer our firms.
When the established good old boys – Jourdan, Nygren, Schaffer, etc, keep getting their people elected and placed on boards, this is what you get.
Who is to say Francis isn’t a nice person.
She seems nice enough.