TACOMA — Michelle Oliver of Quilcene has filed a lawsuit against Olympic Community Action Programs, Quilcene Community Center and several individuals, claiming emotional distress, slander, fraud, assault, conversion and breach of contract as well as violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The lawsuit, filed July 30 with United States District Court, Western District of Washington, asks for a jury trial. No trial has been set.
“I’m not looking to make a huge amount of money,” Oliver said. “What I’m really looking to do, in addition to the personal issues that need to be confronted through this lawsuit, I really want to shine a light on how south county has been suppressed, in so many ways, through the commissioners and OlyCAP’s behavior.”
Along with OlyCAP, the lawsuit names the Quilcene Community Center (QCC), QCC manager Richard Fitzgerald, Jefferson County Commissioner Greg Brotherton, former OlyCAP Executive Director Cherish Cronmiller and Rodney Miller, OlyCAP’s human resources director.
Fitzgerald and Brotherton declined to comment. Cronmiller and Miller did not return emails seeking comment.
As described in the complaint, Oliver and her husband, John DiMaggio, attended a public meeting at QCC on Nov. 21, 2022, when discussions were held regarding a three-year extension to OlyCAP’s contract. The organization has contracted with Jefferson County to manage the facility.
While at the meeting, Oliver and DiMaggio asked some “pointed questions” and had some heated exchanges with Cronmiller and Brotherton, according to the complaint.
An interim advisory board was formed by attendees of the meeting, according to the complaint. OlyCAP’s contract specified that an advisory board should be appointed by OlyCAP, but there had not been a board during OlyCAP’s tenure at the center, according to the complaint.
The complaint says that in financials provided by Cronmiller, Oliver and DiMaggio found that the community centers managed by OlyCAP (Quilcene, Brinnon and Tri-Area) had been generating funds which were not staying in the communities. The total loss to the three OlyCAP-contracted community centers was about $200,000, according to the complaint.
On Dec. 19, 2022, Oliver and DiMaggio made comments on the financials and operational management at QCC during a Board of Jefferson County Commissioners meeting. Brotherton said he would look into the issues, according to the complaint.
The complaint describes Brotherton, Oliver and DiMaggio meeting on a separate occassion where Brotheron told DiMaggio to “forget about the past and focus on the future.”
It also says Brotherton pledged the completion of a commercial kitchen and the installation of community showers if DiMaggio stopped bringing up the past.
DiMaggio indicated that a full audit of past financials would still be necessary.
Cronmiller initially answered a list of questions from DiMaggio, according to the complaint, but as he continued to press for more, she sent an email saying that she would not allow people on the board who were asking questions about OlyCAP financials.
The complaint says Cronmiller attended a QCC advisory board meeting soon after and told the board that anyone interested in talking about program financials or performance should not be a part of the board. During the same meeting, she acknowledged funds were taken from QCC and pledged to return $8,000 — or one year’s profits — to the board for program scheduling. That didn’t happen, according to the complaint.
The complaint also described an encounter between Fitzgerald, Oliver, DiMaggio and Craig Uchida on March 21, 2023. Oliver and DiMaggio went to QCC for a meeting about a potential skate park. Oliver found Fitzgerald and Uchida in a back room after she heard shouting. When Oliver entered the room, Fitzgerald turned to her and began yelling at her regarding her pursuit of ballet classes, according to the complaint.
The complaint says Oliver tried to calm the conversation down but failed. DiMaggio entered and tried turning the conversation toward recent changes in “policies and procedures.” Fitzgerald then turned his aggression toward him, and the encounter led to a request for a protective order.
Oliver said her post-traumatic stress disorder was triggered by this event, according to the complaint.
The complaint added that Oliver filed a complaint with OlyCAP, concerned about being able to continue volunteering with Fitzgerald at QCC.
A food bank manager indicated to Oliver that she spoke with Cronmiller, ascertaining that Fitzgerald would not be at the center overlapping with Oliver’s volunteer schedule.
On March 29, 2023, Oliver said she saw Fitzgerald at the center and became agitated. She reached out to OlyCAP’s human resources department. Later Oliver was told that Brotherton would deal with the issue, according to the complaint.
In early April 2023, Oliver, DiMaggio and Uchida met with Brotherton to discuss his support of the commercial kitchen and public showers/bathrooms for QCC. Brotherton informed them that it would be inconvenient to remove Fitzgerald from the center and said the three of them were creating a toxic environment, referring to them as “the Spanish Inquisition,” according to the complaint.
Further, if they did not back down on financial investigations, he told them he would pull his support from the QCC improvements, and he would have them removed from the advisory board, according to the complaint.
Afterward, Oliver, DiMaggio and Uchida received emails from Cronmiller notifying them they were no longer to serve as a part of the food bank’s volunteer program. Cronmiller said the Retired Senior Volunteer Program was for volunteers 55 and older. Oliver was 50 at the time, according to the complaint.
Oliver and DiMaggio stopped volunteering for the next year, they said.
“I spent basically a year licking my wounds, getting my treatment back up,” Oliver said.
This past March, Uchida asked Oliver and DiMaggio to return to volunteer at the food bank. Although Uchida had been named in Cronmiller’s email notifying them to cease volunteering, Uchida had been able to continue as a volunteer. Uchida also had become the new Jefferson County Food Bank Association president, according to the complaint.
After they returned to volunteer at QCC, someone photographed Oliver and DiMaggio and sent the pictures to Fitzgerald, according to the complaint. Fitzgerald called the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office to have Oliver and DiMaggio trespassed. They were not asked to leave by the deputies, according to the complaint.
Oliver said she is seeking justice for herself as well as south Jefferson County.
“I have intense PTSD, I am on disability, I’ve been incapacitated for a long time,” she said. “I was working through my treatment. It seemed like a good idea for me to go out to the community. My husband and I wanted to volunteer, and we found the Quilcene Food Bank. That was the first time I’d come out into the world instead of being hidden away in my little home for years.
“It was great,” she continued. “We went in during COVID, we were the people who talked to people who wouldn’t get vaccinated so they couldn’t come in. We would figure out what they wanted, go in and shop for them, bring them the food. It was a tricky thing to do, and it was hard, but I really enjoyed it. I really thrived on it. I found that I kind of found what I wanted to do in life, which is really just to help people.”
Oliver said they became more involved and took on more responsibilities as time went on, and they got to know the clients who would visit, which helped them serve the community.
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Reporter Elijah Sussman can be reached by email at elijah.sussman@sequimgazette.com.
