PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles School Board has unanimously approved a $175,000 legal settlement with former special education teacher Kimberley Davis, who filed a federal lawsuit against the district for gender discrimination in U.S. District Court for Western Washington in May 2020.
The school board took the action Tuesday.
In the settlement agreement, Davis and the district agreed to resolve their dispute without further litigation, and neither admitted to any wrongdoing or liability.
The agreement can be found at https://go.boarddocs.com/wa/pasd/Board.nsf/files/CKTVHM80D792/$file/Settlement%202.0.pdf.
According to court documents, the criminal case had been scheduled to be heard in district court in Tacoma on Tuesday.
Davis’ suit contended that she had been a target of harassment and disparate treatment based on her sexual orientation, and that the district had retaliated against her by providing negative job references when she sought employment in other districts after it fired her in February 2020.
The district claimed it terminated Davis’ contract because she falsified student records and asserted that Davis was not discriminated against and was treated no differently than other employees.
Davis’ attorney, Dan Gallagher, said that accepting the settlement and walking away from a 20-year career teaching in the district had not been easy for his client, but some of the pre-trial decisions by the court and the uncertainty of the jury system led to the decision to end the lawsuit.
“We thought it would be best just to resolve it and the district made what we thought was a reasonable offer in the circumstances,” Gallagher said.
“The bottom line is, you can’t always control what’s going to happen in a trial, but in a settlement, at least, you can make sure that there’s some cash to help you move on.”
Also named in Davis’ original suit along with the district were Amity Butler, the principal at Franklin Elementary at the time of Davis’ employment, and Patricia Reifenstahl, a paraeductor who worked in Davis’ classroom.
The court dismissed them as parties to the suit in May 2021. Riefenstahl died in 2020.
An attorney for the district, Lucy Clifthorne, could not be reached for comment.
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Reporter Paula Hunt can be reached at paula.hunt@soundpublishing.com
