Spillman et al v. Northeast Oklahoma Community Action Agency et al
Filing
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OPINION AND ORDER by Judge John E Dowdell granting defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. 38). ; dismissing/terminating case (terminates case) ; granting 38 Motion for Summary Judgment (Re: 1 Complaint ) (SAS, Chambers)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA
PATTI STUMP,
)
)
Plaintiff,
)
)
v.
)
)
NORTHEAST OKLAHOMA COMMUNITY )
ACTION AGENCY; JEAN COOPER,
)
)
Defendants.
)
Case No. 13-CV-401-JED-TLW
OPINION AND ORDER
I.
Background
Plaintiff, Patti Stump, was employed by defendant, Northeast Oklahoma Community
Action Agency (NEOCAA) from 1976 until her employment was terminated on June 18, 2012
following a Special Meeting of the NEOCAA Board of Directors. At all times material to this
action, Stump was the Assistant Head Start Director for NEOCAA.
NEOCAA is a private, non-profit entity that serves as a community action agency,
administering grants that provide community assistance in Northeast Oklahoma. During the time
of Stump’s employment, NEOCAA was the grantee of the federal Head Start grant for Craig,
Ottawa, and Delaware Counties. NEOCAA is governed by an 18 member Board of Directors.
Defendant Jean Cooper has been the Executive Director of NEOCAA since 1998. NEOCAA’s
Board of Directors shares decision making authority with an independent Policy Council in the
hiring and firing of key Head Start employees. Federal regulations require that the Board and
Policy Council concur on such employment decisions or otherwise invoke impasse protocols.
NEOCAA has presented evidence of continuous conflict between Ms. Stump and other
NEOCAA staff. As a result, in May 2011, Ms. Cooper commissioned an outside organization
consultant to conduct a complete organizational review of NEOCAA, including the Head Start
program, in order to isolate the sources of the conflict. The report of the consultant, which was
provided in September 2011, contained specific negative findings regarding Stump, including
that she was confrontational and combative with Cooper and did not appear to desire a working
relationship with Cooper. There were also suspicions that Stump and Mel Douglas Spillman,
who was then the Director of the Head Start program, were engaged in a romantic or sexual
relationship, and Cooper met separately with each of them.1
relationship.
They both denied any such
On January 12, 2012, almost four months after Cooper inquired about any
relationship between Stump and Spillman, Stump filed a charge with the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission (EEOC) complaining about Cooper’s inquiry and alleging a hostile
work environment.
In April 2012, Cooper discovered that Spillman’s granddaughter, as well as several other
children who were “over-income” for the requirements of Head Start program eligibility, had
been enrolled in the Head Start program ahead of income-eligible children. According to
NEOCAA, those enrollments were a serious violation of Head Start Performance Standards and
represented a financial liability to the program, and the violations were the direct responsibility
of Stump. Cooper suspended Stump and Spillman, pending consideration by the Board of
Directors and the Policy Council of Cooper’s recommendation for their termination. Stump
appealed the suspension to the NEOCAA Board of Directors. Thereafter, before the Board met
to consider the appeal and Cooper’s recommendation that Stump be involuntarily terminated, the
Policy Council provided the Board written notice of the Policy Council’s intent to object to
Stump’s termination.
1
Mr. Spillman, who was initially a plaintiff in this action, died following the filing of suit,
and the Court dismissed him from this action pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 25(a)(1). (Doc. 35).
2
The Board of Directors met on June 18, 2012. It considered the relinquishment of the
Head Start grant to avoid the otherwise inevitable impasse protocol that would be necessitated by
the Policy Council’s refusal to concur in a decision to terminate Stump’s employment. At the
June 18 meeting, the Board of Directors denied Stump’s appeal and voted to terminate her
employment. Recognizing that the Policy Council objected to that decision, the Board also voted
to relinquish the Head Start grant.
Thereafter, the federal government contracted with an
independent company to administer the Head Start program, and the employment relationships
between NEOCAA and all Head Start staff were terminated.
Ms. Stump brought this lawsuit against NEOCAA and Ms. Cooper. Stump contends that
the defendants violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and that her employment was
terminated in retaliation for filing the January 2012 EEOC complaint. However, the cornerstone
of her Complaint, and the entire focus of her summary judgment briefing, is her argument that
the decision to terminate plaintiff “violated the provisions of the Head Start Act
642(c)(2)(D)(vii) [sic] and the Head Start Performance Standards § 45 C.F.R. 1304.50(d)(1)(xi)
[sic].” (Doc. 1 at 4-5, ¶ 25; see also Doc. 46 at 2). Plaintiff contends that those provisions
require “shared decision making on all termination decisions.” (Doc. 46 at 2).2
2
It appears that Ms. Stump intended to cite 42 U.S.C. § 9837(c)(2)(D)(vi), which provides,
inter alia, that a policy council created under the Head Start Act “shall approve and submit to the
governing body decisions about each of the following activities: . . . Program personnel policies
and decisions regarding the employment of program staff, consistent with paragraph
(1)(E)(iv)(IX), including standards of conduct for program staff, contractors, and volunteers and
criteria for the employment and dismissal of program staff.” The regulation cited by Ms. Stump,
45 C.F.R. § 1304.50(d)(1)(xi), provides that “Policy Councils . . . must work in partnership with
key management staff and the governing body to develop, review, and approve or disapprove the
following policies and procedures: . . . Decisions to hire or terminate any person who works
primarily for the Early Head Start or Head Start program of the grantee or delegate agency.”
3
II.
Discussion
A.
Employment Discrimination and Retaliation Claims
Although Ms. Stump’s Complaint alleges a hostile work environment, discrimination,
and retaliation in violation of Title VII, she does not even mention those claims in her response
to NEOCAA’s summary judgment motion.
Indeed, it appears that she has completely
abandoned those claims, as her response does not contain a single reference to any claim or
evidence of discrimination, hostile work environment, or retaliation.3
As set forth in NEOCAA’s motion and exhibits, Stump admitted at her deposition that
there was no improper discrimination based upon any protected status. (See Doc. 39 at ¶ 13 and
cited deposition excerpts at Doc. 39-4). She also admitted that there was no protected statusbased hostile work environment (Doc. 39-4 at 69-70).
Her definition of hostile work
environment was simply “[v]ery unpleasant working conditions,” which applied to staff in the
Head Start office and included “accusing people of this or that or leaving confidential
information out of employees checks and routing numbers . . . telling staff that, hey, this person
borrowed from their annuity, go ask them how much - - how they did it and how they liked it.”
(Doc. 39-4 at 68-69).
3
While Stump generally purports to “dispute” several undisputed facts in NEOCAA’s
motion, she provided no evidence that established a dispute of material fact. All of the exhibits
submitted by Stump relate solely to her claim that the Policy Council and Board disagreed as to
the decision to terminate her. She did not provide any evidence to dispute NEOCAA’s evidence
that there was continuous conflict between Stump and Cooper and that Stump was responsible
for the improper Head Start enrollment of children who were “over-income” for the requirements
of Head Start program eligibility ahead of income-eligible children. Where, as here, the movant
has provided evidence supporting its statement of undisputed facts, the non-moving party must
cite to evidence showing that there is a dispute of fact. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(1). Because Stump
failed to do so, the Court may consider the movant’s facts to be undisputed for purposes of the
motion. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e)(2).
4
With respect to her retaliation claim, Stump has not identified any evidence that her filing
of the EEOC charge in January 2012 was a but-for cause of her termination nearly five months
later. Again, any argument or evidence relating to retaliation is completely absent from her
response brief, and it appears that she has abandoned that claim.
There is no genuine dispute of material fact with respect to plaintiff’s claims of
employment discrimination, hostile work environment, or retaliation, and the Court concludes
that NEOCAA is entitled to judgment as a matter of law on those claims.
B.
Alleged Violations of the Head Start Act
Ms. Stump’s entire response brief is dedicated to her claim that the termination of her
employment was in violation of federal Head Start provisions, because the Policy Council did
not agree with the Board of Directors with respect to the termination of her employment. (Doc.
46). However, Stump has not provided any authority in support of her assertion of a private right
of action for the termination of her employment under the Head Start Act or regulations. Other
district courts addressing this issue have determined that the Head Start statutes and regulations
do not provide a private right of action to terminated employees. See, e.g., Hodder v. Schoharie
Cty. Child Dev. Council, Inc., No. 95-CV-557, 1995 WL 760832 (N.D.N.Y. Nov. 14, 1995);
Johnson v. Quin Rivers Agency for Comm. Action, Inc., 128 F. Supp. 2d 332 (E.D. Va. 2001);
Holocheck v. Luzerne Cty. Head Start, Inc., 385 F. Supp. 2d 491 (M.D. Pa. 2005); Addison v.
City of Detroit-Dep’t of Human Servs., No. 12-12793, 2013 WL 1278954 (E.D. Mich. Mar. 27,
2013).
The plaintiffs in Hodder were employed by a Head Start grantee and were terminated for
being uncooperative and insubordinate after the hiring of a new executive director. Like Ms.
Stump here, the Hodder plaintiffs filed suit, alleging that their dismissals violated the Head Start
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Act and related regulations because “the Policy Council must approve terminations, which did
not happen in this case.” Hodder, 1995 WL 760832 at *2. After thoroughly analyzing the
purpose, history and text of the applicable Head Start laws, the district court concluded that
terminated employees are not within the class of persons “for whose special benefit Congress
enacted the Head Start Act,” and the act did not create any express or implied private right of
action for discharged employees. Id. at *2-8.
Similarly, in Holocheck, a former Head Start employee filed suit, alleging that Head Start
regulations provided an independent right “not to be terminated in violation of the written
Personnel Policies and Practices of [the Head Start grantee].” 386 F. Supp. 2d at 501. The court
noted the statutorily-stated purpose of the Head Start Act and determined that the plaintiff, a
Head Start teacher, was not in the class of the legislation’s intended beneficiaries and there was
no statutory provision that conferred a private right to continued employment in the Head Start
program. Accordingly, the court dismissed the plaintiff’s claim that the Head Start regulations
provided a cause of action. Id. at 501-02.
In Johnson, 128 F. Supp. 2d at 336-37, the court determined that “[t]here is no provision
in the Head Start Act . . . permitting a private citizen to enforce its provisions” and thus
dismissed with prejudice the plaintiff’s claims alleging violations of statutory and regulatory
provisions relating to the Head Start Act. In Addison, 2013 WL 1278954, at *4-6, a former
employee who was paid through a Head Start grant sued after being notified that she was laid off
after the Head Start grant was unilaterally relinquished, allegedly in violation of Head Start
regulations. The court dismissed the action, concluding that “there is no private right of action
for an alleged violation of the Head Start Regulations.” Id. at *4.
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The Court agrees with the reasoning in Hodder, Johnson, Holocheck, and Addison. The
stated purpose of the Head Start Act is “to promote the school readiness of low-income children
by enhancing their cognitive, social, and emotional development—(1) in a learning environment
that supports children’s growth in language, literacy, mathematics, science, social and emotional
functioning, creative arts, physical skills, and approaches to learning; and (2) through the
provision to low-income children and their families of health, educational, nutritional, social, and
other services that are determined, based on family needs assessments, to be necessary.” 42
U.S.C. § 9831. Terminated employees of Head Start grantees are not within the class of persons
who are the intended beneficiaries of this legislation. Moreover, as noted in the foregoing
authorities, the applicable statutory provisions do not provide any express private right of action
for Ms. Stump, and no such right can be implied under the circumstances.
III.
Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, the Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. 38) is granted. A
separate Judgment will be entered forthwith.
IT IS SO ORDERED this 30th day of June, 2015.
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