MPC Brouhaha Continues as Agency Faces Lawsuit Over Sex-Discrimination Claims

In News by S. Heather Duncanleave a COMMENT

A former employee of the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission has filed a lawsuit against the commission, Knox County, and the city of Knoxville, alleging that she was fired last year in retaliation for helping a co-worker pursue a sex-discrimination complaint.

Dee Anne Reynolds, the only woman in management at the commission, was fired by former MPC executive director Mark Donaldson for insubordination in June 2014, after almost 12 years at the agency. The decision came three weeks before Donaldson announced his own retirement from the office, which handles countywide land-use planning and administers zoning rules.

As reported by former Metro Pulse writer Cari Wade Gervin on her Tumblr on July 9, Reynolds’ lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court almost exactly a year later, demands compensation in the form of lost pay or reinstatement to her former job as finance manager, plus attorney’s fees and interest. Donaldson is not named as an individual in the suit.

Essentially, Reynolds claims she was fired for helping Elizabeth Albertson, who still works in comprehensive planning at MPC, file a complaint in 2013 about sex discrimination and unequal pay. Albertson had approached Reynolds, as the only woman in management, to guide her through the process. Both Albertson and Reynolds declined to comment for this story.

In the complaint, Albertson accused her supervisor Mike Carberry of refusing to provide her with the same administrative support received by her male co-workers, asking her to perform secretarial duties, publicly belittling her, passing her over in favor of men for projects for which she was best qualified, denying her resources she needed to do her job (such as software her male colleagues had), and paying her less than her male counterpart.

According to the lawsuit, Donaldson dismissed the accusations, suggesting Albertson discuss it “over a beer” or “on the golf course.” A subsequent meeting with both Carberry and Donaldson was allegedly “very intimidating” toward Albertson, who was not allowed to have another female present.

Nothing got any better for Albertson, the lawsuit states. And for Reynolds, things got worse.

Donaldson was allegedly angry at both women for going to Knox County’s Human Resources Department, which they believed was the correct procedure, according to the employee handbook they had been given. (According to the lawsuit, Human Resources employees agreed that the facts Albertson described would amount to sex discrimination and equal-pay violations.) But the county denied that it had jurisdiction, and Albertson apparently couldn’t appeal to anyone else.

That led Reynolds to ask whether MPC actually had an equal-opportunity policy. She questioned whether the lack of such a policy could jeopardize federal grant funds, which make up a significant portion of the MPC budget. She repeatedly went to MPC Chair Rebecca Longmire and the commission’s executive committee about this question, the lawsuit states. In a memo to Donaldson and MPC attorney Steve Wise, Reynolds said it made her “concerned” about how to proceed with the year’s financial statements and first-quarter grant billings. She raised the specter of the commission having to repay $2.3 million in funds granted in the previous three years.

The day after Reynolds sent this memo, Donaldson consulted an attorney about firing her, the lawsuit indicates. Instead, he gave her a harshly worded written “warning” regarding what he called Reynolds’ “irrational, erroneous and strident claims” and basically accused her of holding financial statements hostage until Albertson was satisfied. In his warning letter, Donaldson forbade Reynolds to speak about MPC matters with any elected officials or city and county staff except a few key people she had to contact as part of her finance job.

Reynolds’ lawsuit claims the retaliation continued, driving Reynolds to file a complaint with Longmire in May. About six weeks later, Reynolds was fired.

In February of this year, Reynolds filed a charge of retaliation with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a federal agency that reviews discrimination claims. If the EEOC acknowledges that Reynolds has a right to sue, the lawsuit states she will add Civil Rights Act discrimination claims.

Knox County spokesman Michael Grider, Knox County Law Director Bud Armstrong, Knoxville spokesman Jesse Mayshark, and MPC attorney Steve Wise all say their organizations have no comment on the lawsuit at this time. (Mayshark pointed out that the city and county are included in the lawsuit because they fund the MPC.) City and county officials said they had not been served with the lawsuit by Monday. Wise says the lawsuit was served to MPC on Monday, and the agency will file a response. “It’s early, and it will develop,” he says.

It’s clear from the attachments to Reynolds’ lawsuit that a hefty paper trail likely exists on both sides. As responses are filed, we may learn more about MPC’s perspective on these events.

In addition to the complaints addressed in the lawsuit, the situation raises important issues about public access and input. Can someone employed by a government—or anyone for that matter—be banned by their boss from speaking to their own elected officials?

More specifically, the public depends on MPC to develop clear and protective plans and zoning, but Albertson’s discrimination complaint implies that management may have been regularly compromising public participation in that process. For example, Albertson coordinated public meetings for the controversial Hillside and Ridgetop Task Force, which was creating a plan to guide when and how development could occur on Knoxville’s ridges. Albertson’s discrimination complaint states that early in this process, she determined three existing plans already limited development and clearing in areas with steep slopes, and she argued that MPC should draft codes and ordinances based on those. However, her complaint says Carberry ignored her, insisting on a new plan (subject to a much broader amount of debate, and probably a much longer process) for handling this type of development. Albertson’s complaint also claims MPC management’s refusal to set timelines and deadlines resulted in last-minute public meetings that allowed projects to proceed “with little regard for significant public input.”

This might not come as a surprise to some MPC-watchers. Before Donaldson’s retirement, and at about the same time Reynolds was fired, a group of community leaders sent a letter to MPC asking commissioners to remove him from the job. The letter, signed by several former City Council members and many neighborhood association leaders, said that under Donaldson’s leadership the office was producing an “incompetent, unacceptable work product.” It also faulted him for hiring longtime friend David Hill at a six-figure salary without advertising the job or interviewing other candidates.

Since Reynolds was fired, almost the entire leadership team at MPC has turned over. Donaldson, Hill, Carberry, and deputy director Buz Johnson are gone. Carberry retired in May 2014, about a month before Reynolds was fired. His departure was followed by Donaldson’s, then Johnson’s in September. Hill left in April, shortly before the city and county mayors chose Gerald Green as MPC’s new executive director.

Reynolds’ lawsuit airs yet another facet of what Green has inherited—and an opportunity. With multiple management jobs open, Green will be in an unusually good position to set a new tone for the office with his hires. Green’s selection marked the first time an MPC director was not picked by the planning commission board. Instead, the two mayors appointed a six-member search committee with representatives from their administrations, MPC, and the community. Green, who earned his master’s degree at the University of Tennessee, most recently served as planning director for Jackson County in western North Carolina. His previous experience includes a stint as chief planner for Asheville during a period when key downtown areas were being redeveloped.

S. Heather Duncan has won numerous awards for her feature writing and coverage of the environment, government, education, business and local history during her 15-year reporting career. Originally from Western North Carolina, Heather has worked for Radio Free Europe, the Institute for War and Peace Reporting in London, and several daily newspapers. Heather spent almost a dozen years at The Telegraph in Macon, Ga., where she spent most of her time covering the environment or writing project-investigations that provoked changes such as new laws related to day care and the protection of environmentally-sensitive lands. You can reach Heather at heather@knoxmercury.com

Share this Post