Mario K. Castillo Email & Phone Number

Houston, Tx, Us

The Woodlands, Tx, Us

The Woodlands, Tx, Us

It is my experience that in many companies the General Counsel also has an operational title to help place that individual within the hierarchy of the institution (Vice President, Vice Chancellor, etc.). My situation is different because my second title has always carried with it operational responsibilities outside of the legal function. In other words, I have one set of divisions, an office, and staff that I oversee out of the Office of the Chief Operating Officer, and another set of divisions, an office, and staff that I simultaneously oversee out of the Office of the General Counsel. For ease (and because LinkedIn has "Description Limits"), I have organized my page here by functional area. I have been the General Counsel here since 2015. I have been the COO since 2017.I became COO in 2017 during -- literally -- Hurricane Harvey. As Vice Chancellor I had Legal, HR, and Compliance, but as COO, I've picked up the Police Department and serve as the civilian Police Commissioner, the Office of Emergency Management, the Department of Emergency Preparedness, the Office of Academic Success (the system's Chief Academic Officer reports to me); and the Office of Student Success (the system's Chief Student Services Officer reports to me). I have been the executive in charge of safety and security system wide since 2017. I have helped manage this institution's day-to-day responses to massive hurricanes, pandemics, floods, etc. I am also the executive in charge of overseeing all physical threats to the safety and security of our 7.6M square feet of property. During the height of the pandemic, I personally oversaw all of our reopenings, PPE acquisition, sorting, distributions, and deliveries. I personally drafted our COVID-19 protocols, procedures, manuals, and forms. I primarily see myself as a facilitator for my colleagues as COO, helping them navigate our diverse stakeholders, interests, and perspectives.

The Woodlands, Tx, Us

In my advisory role, I personally keep and manage most labor & employment cases formerly outsourced. As General Counsel I have managed, implemented, and overseen every facet of labor and employment advice ranging from performance management, employee relations, human resources counseling, internal-hearing management, rewriting policies, procedures, business processes, forms, and other related documents, and ultimately litigation in various jurisdictions. I have also provided legal advice on constitutional law, real estate law, intellectual property, student services matters, Title IX, Cleary, academic issues (including academic freedom).In my governance role, I personally review board agendas, preparation of minutes, resolutions, and board agenda items, running public elections, scheduling, and attending general assemblies, executive meetings, and committee meetings; it also includes drafting, preparing for votes, editing, reviewing, and recommending revisions to the board’s governance handbook; and finally serving as parliamentarian regarding Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised, 12th edition.In my transactional role, I personally draft labor and employment contracts and some instructional, construction, goods-and-services, and facility-use contracts as well as most contracts that would come across the desk of a chief legal officer overseeing a one-billion-dollar business. I also developed and implemented in-house writing and drafting manuals largely influenced by Bryan Garner’s Modern American Usage and The Winning Brief on the persuasive side, and Kenneth A. Adams’s A Manual of Style for Contract Drafting on the transactional side.

The Woodlands, Tx, Us

I was simultaneously the system's Chief Operating Officer, its Chief Legal Officer, and the Interim President of Lone Star College - Kingwood. I chose not to be considered, and did not apply, to become the permanent president because my intent was always to return to my system-level post. I gave my word on the first day of my interim presidency, and I kept it. Lone Star College – Kingwood is one of seven colleges within the Lone Star College System District. LSC-Kingwood had nearly 12,000 students enrolled in Spring 2021, 795 employees, about 120 full-time faculty members, and 540,000 square feet of property at its main campus and two associated centers. It has an annual operating budget of about 32 million dollars.

The Woodlands, Tx, Us

In 2016, about a year after being hired to become the General Counsel, I received a promotion to Vice Chancellor and General Counsel. With the Vice Chancellorship came the additional responsibilities of overseeing a legacy HR division and creating a new compliance division that is now known as the Office of Governance, Accountability, and Compliance.In the Office of Human Resources, we completely redesigned, reorganized, and recreated the Office of Human Resources since 2016. A person that worked in OHR in 2015 would simply not recognize it in 2022. We completely redesigned the HR operational structure and functions. Part of that was a complete revamping of all of HR’s hiring processes—including a change in the ATS. The entire system moved from Oracle TAM 9.2 to TALEO to TAM again. We oversaw the digitization of all HR records and leave management processes (FMLA, ADA, etc.). We managed a compensation analysis, regrade of all bands, and compression analysis and correction for every single faculty and non-faculty employee. We developed, implemented, and amended equity and diversity scorecards for all hires leaning into DEI well before it became fashionable to do so.In the Office of Governance, Accountability, and Compliance we created, built, and hired the System’s first compliance division in its nearly 50-year history. It started out with about a handful of employees that became our Department of Incident Management (i.e., our internal investigators/ombudsmen). It has since grown to include Departments of Accessibility Services and Resources, Compliance Education and Training, Ethics and Compliance Services (including Title IX), Compliance Management (tracking hundreds of compliance items), and Environmental Health and Life Safety, Records Compliance and Management (public records). The team and I have worked together to develop business processes, policies, procedures, forms, reference manuals, for all these teams largely from scratch.

Houston, Texas, Us

On the litigation side, I primarily focus on federal court litigation defending management in labor and employment disputes. I have handled all matters between receiving a demand letter to the entry of judgment--including trial experience. I enjoy writing dispositive motions as much as the average romantic enjoys long walks on the beach.On the investigation side, I have conducted internal sexual harassment investigations, represented clients in wage and hour investigations by the Department of Labor, and represented clients in immigration compliance investigations by the Department of Homeland Security.On the consulting side, I primarily focus on advising employers how to navigate the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate (from whether the ACA applies to them to implementing it in the most adequate way on a company-by-company basis). I have also conducted extensive Form I-9 audits to ensure compliance with the nation's immigration laws.

I was responsible for managing and briefing the judge on the civil docket, including researching complex motions in preparation for drafting all his civil orders and opinions. I briefed Judge Recio on over 300 civil actions while I was his briefing attorney ranging from complex immigration, habeas corpus, admiralty, breach of contract, tort, labor and employment, and product liability cases. If it typically can be found in a federal court, I saw it over the four years I served in Brownsville. I also assisted the Judge's Courtroom Deputy in managing the criminal docket, including drafting complex orders on a variety of motions and preparing bench briefs for lengthy hearings. The Brownsville Division of the Southern District of Texas is one of the busiest criminal courts in the United States. I was involved and helped prepare the Court for initial appearances, arraignments, preliminary examinations, detention hearings, motion hearings, rearraignments, and sentencing. I also worked on asset forfeiture and extradition cases while I served in Brownsville.

Tx, Us

While I was serving as a briefing attorney / law clerk in the Brownsville Division of the Southern District of Texas, I took a second job as an adjunct instructor at UTB. I taught Fundamentals of Criminal Law to students in the Criminal Justice Department.

Bloomington, Indiana, Us

I was first a research assistant for Professor Hannah Buxbaum. Professor Buxbaum was writing an article on international securties transactions involving foreign investors, foreign issuers, and foreign exchanges. Professor Buxbaum's article surveyed many transactions and disputes that required extensive research on my part.I was then a research assistant to Professor Joshua Fairfield. Professor Fairfield is an ecommerce expert whose writings primarily arise from the injection of the internet and virtual worlds into traditional doctrines like contracts and torts. I helped him research several key virtual worlds for his research.I was finally a research assistant to Professors Sarah Hughes and David P. Fidler. Professors Hughes and Fidler were writing a book entitled "Responding to National Security Letters: A Practical Guide for Legal Counsel." I conducted extensive research, made editorial suggestions to several chapters, and was responsible for half the footnotes in the entire book.

I drafted basic orders for the law clerks to review. I primarily spent my summer working on an electrical engineering patent case that was scheduled for a Markman hearing in mid-August 2007.

I was responsible for drafting over 40 briefs on the Government's behalf opposing inmate criminal appeals.

I was assigned to Masterword's Child Protective Services contract where I interpreted for CPS on family visits, during investigations, and in-office visits.

Doctor Of Law (J.D.), Law

Bachelor Of Arts (B.A.), Government