Española Mayor Joseph Maestas’ administration can finally stop fighting the lawsuits it spurred when it fired four directors at its first meeting in March 2006.
The last of those suits — brought by former Senior Center Director Christine Bustos — was dismissed Dec. 9 from state District Court. Bustos received no settlement and neither side was awarded court costs or attorney fees, according to court documents.
Attorney Paula Maynes, who represented the city in the lawsuit, said a new administration has the right to make changes in policy-making positions.
“When an administration changes, they have the right to replace people who are exempt to reflect their new policies and the new direction they want to take,” Maynes said. “That’s what the moral is of these cases.”
Maynes’ qualifier of “people who are exempt” was a key issue. Bustos claimed that although city policy technically made her an exempt employee, susceptible to termination for any reason, that policy had never been implemented and was verbally nullified by multiple city managers.
In dismissing the case, District Judge James Hall ruled that Bustos was in fact an exempt employee, Maynes said.
“His words to us were, ‘The word exempt means exempt, and I think everyone knows what that means,’” Maynes said.
The victory in Bustos’ suit brings the city to a 3-1 record in the four lawsuits that resulted from the 2006 firings. Two of the suits — by former planning director Marvin Vigil and former human resources director Ken Kollecker — were dismissed in federal court. The city settled in state District Court with former finance director Lillian Brooks, to the tune of nearly $30,000.
The main difference seems to be that Brooks claimed she was hired as a regular, non-exempt employee and was never officially notified of any change in that status.
The city recovered more than $8,000 in court costs in its win over Vigil’s lawsuit, but their request for over $10,000 in attorney fees was denied. Maynes said the city agreed not to pursue roughly $3,000 in court costs from Bustos. In exchange, Bustos agreed to drop a pending motion that, if granted, would have amended the suit and raised first-amendment issues.
The city is also stuck with its legal fees in the case. Although the city is insured against civil lawsuits, Maynes said the Bustos litigation did not meet the minimum value for coverage. The cost of fighting the lawsuit will come of the city’s legal budget, Maynes said.