SEQUIM — Vernon Stoner, the almost-hired Sequim city manager found to be the target of a sexual harassment claim at his previous job, came to address the City Council in person Monday night.
“Let me first apologize,” Stoner said, “for what you’ve seen in the news media.”
He was referring to Sunday’s Peninsula Daily News report that on June 15, Stoner was fired from his post as chief deputy in the state Insurance Commissioner’s Office, and that on May 14 his executive assistant there had filed a sexual harassment claim against him.
The council — which voted to hire Stoner on Sept. 1 and planned to sign his employment contract at Monday’s meeting — had been informed of neither incident by Tom Waldron of Waldron & Co., the Seattle recruiter it hired to find a new city manager.
Instead of signing the contract, the council will meet again next week — and will seek from Waldron & Co. more background information on all four finalists for city manager.
The sexual harassment claim against Stoner, made by Shellyne Grisham of Olympia, was settled Aug. 31 with a $50,000 payment from the state of Washington.
‘Caught by surprise’
During his brief address Monday night, Stoner told the council he was “caught completely by surprise” by news of that settlement.
“There has never been a finding of sexual harassment,” he said.
In 30 years in various government posts, “I have managed thousands of employees,” he said, adding that for the most part “I have made those employees happy.”
“I’m not going to say that I haven’t made some mistakes, and said some things that were inappropriate . . . I’m not perfect.”
Stoner then emphasized that he welcomes further background checks.
“I can assure you,” he told the council, “you will not find any findings as to sexual harassment.”
Council member Walt Schubert asked the first question: “Why didn’t you tell us more,” about your employment history?
“I wasn’t given any particular reason for the commissioner’s termination,” Stoner replied.
He called the sexual harassment complaint a “‘he said, she said’ kind of thing,” and added that he had done nothing inappropriate.
But “in retrospect, I should have” disclosed the firing from the Insurance Commissioner’s Office.
On administrative leave
When council member Bill Huizinga asked whether “that employee” — Grisham — resigned or was terminated, Stoner said, “I do not know the status of the employee . . . she was on administrative leave when I left.”
Huizinga asked whether Stoner knew the reasons for the administrative leave
“She indicated she was having some personal issues,” Stoner said.
As Stoner took a seat, city attorney and interim city manager Craig Ritchie made his recommendation to the council.
“We only received this information Friday afternoon. I did as much investigation as I could . . . I’m still missing some documents,” he began.
“My suggestion is that we call [Waldron] to ask him to do additional investigation . . . and ask if he wants to charge us to do that.”
Council member Ken Hays said Waldron instead owes Sequim a visit.
“I have some questions,” Hays said, of the recruiter to whom the city paid $20,000 to bring in the pool of candidates from which Stoner was chosen.
Audience comments
The council then turned to the audience for comments — though Mayor Laura Dubois admonished would-be speakers to “be very careful what you say.”
Ritchie echoed that: “We need to be careful we’re not a forum for inappropriate comments.”
The only one to come to the podium was longtime Sequim resident Mary Bell, who served on the panel of community members that interviewed Stoner when he came to town Aug. 25.
“I would have appreciated knowing there was a several-million-dollar claim against the state of Washington by Mr. Stoner,” Bell said, referring to the PDN report that Stoner, who is black and 61, has filed a lawsuit in Thurston County Superior Court claiming that “age or race discrimination” played a role in his firing.
Stoner seeks damages of $1 million to $20 million, his lawyer, Judith Longquist of Seattle, has said.
As for the forthcoming investigation of Stoner’s recent past, council member Erik Erichsen questioned the wisdom of having Waldron do the job.
Ritchie defended the firm, saying it had followed standard procedure by checking Stoner’s “economic records, criminal records and, of course, references,” and had “found no negative results on any of the candidates.”
Finally Dubois instructed Ritchie to work with Waldron on “finding the facts and, as best as we can determine, the truth.”
Another meeting
The council will hold a special meeting next Monday, during which Ritchie and Waldron will report on their background checks of the four finalist candidates for city manager: Stoner, Subir Mukerjee, Mark Gervasi and Steven Burkett.
The meeting will be at 5 p.m. in the Sequim Transit Center, 190 W. Cedar St.
Stoner said when he was hired that he will start work in Sequim on Oct. 5; his salary was set at $120,000 per year.
“We can’t say what we’ll do until we find out the facts,” Dubois said after Monday’s meeting.
“I am not happy [with Waldron, and] we’re certainly not going to pay extra for their further investigation,” she added.
“We want all the facts on all four,” Dubois said.
“We don’t want to make any more uninformed decisions.”
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
