April 30, 2007
Amy Lee Gets Her Revenge On San Francisco
Now here's a story we haven't mentioned in awhile, the poor saga of Amy Lee. Lee, if you remember, was the former head of the Building Inspection Department who was opposed by Joe O'Donaghue and his Residential Builders Association gang. During her confirmation hearing, members of the RBA got down and dirty and criticized her for all sorts of things, including the fact that she was pregnant and had "pregnancy brain."
Well, Lee filed a suit with the state Department of Fair Employment and Housing for having to go through all that nastiness. She eventually got her position after another raucous hearing but felt that the criticisms, especially the "pregnancy brain" comment, were "'defamatory, harassing and unlawful statements.'" Her lawyer added that all the craziness "really took the joy out of her being pregnant."
On April 17, the Board of Supes agreed to a settlement, mainly money, reimbursement of legal fees, and twenty weeks of backdated maternity leave. The only member of the Board who voted against the settlement was Tom Ammiano who claimed the settlement was too much and that nasty comments said in public meetings are all par for the course. Dennis Herrera, however, said that part of the settlement was due to stuff that happened outside the hearing. Hmmm…maybe it was because some nefarious organization tried to ruined her Christmas?
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How does she find time to do all this and be the lead singer of Evanescence?
Well, it's all good as long as the Supes feel great about forking over more and more of our tax dollars.
How much longer until MUNI fares and parking ticket fines are raised again? San Franciscans obviously don't pay enough.
(and if I bring this up at a public comment section of a Supes meeting and then sue one of them for making a snide remark back at me, could I expect an easy settlement and free money as well?)
Kudos to Ammiano for the nay vote and showing that he has a spine. The builders are slimeballs for their comments, without a doubt (don't they have wives/kids?). But it's a public job - If you can't hack criticism (fair or not), resign.
Eh? Why does the city have to compensate her? Did city employees make the remarks?
Is Ammiano the only Supe with balls? This is PC payout larceny. Only in San Francisco!
If it turns out that Lee was further harassed by members of the BIC while she was pregnant and acting director, in that they might have treated her differently after her pregnancy was made an issue than they would have had it not been made an issue and she'd "just" been pregnant, then she might have a case.
Herrera seemed to intimate as much in the Chron this AM, but Dennis hasn't exactly seen the level of trust the public has in him rise at the rate of interest offered by those scam banks he's going after, given his recent record of whitewashing and fixing.
-marc
There must be more to this story than just what they said during her confirmation hearings, since there's a legislative privilege for things said during these types of meetings.
I'm with Ammiano on this, I can't believe they paid her off for such a minor matter.
Talk about gaming the system. She was incompetent in that position from day one (yet another one of Gavin's absurd screw-ups), and though the O'Donaghue Irish gangsters were a bunch of jerks, that's part of what they were trying to point out. With this settlement, Amy Lee makes all city employees look bad. She's an embarrassment and should join Rubey-Tourck in the private sector.
How dare they demean her by saying she had "pregnancy brain" -- that is a lawsuit for harassment and discrimination, SF MIKE. Whether or not you think she was qualified is not the point. She was treated like less than any woman should have for a condition that is protected under civil rights under the law. Your comparing her to Ruby Rippy Tourk just shows that you think all women are the enemy. What she does and what RRT did are completely different. Please think through things better, you just hit your male reactive primitive brain and stupidity came out.
Dear discrimination pure and simple: You refer to my "male reactive primitive brain and stupidity came out." That is a gender-based slur that offends me to my manly marrow, and I'm afraid the defamation is so harassing and discriminatory and debilitating that my only recourse is to sue the City and County of San Francisco along with the owner of SFist for $150,000 for publishing your slurs. I'm also going to need 20 weeks of comp time just to get over it. And if you could throw in a free washer/dryer I'd appreciate it.
Amy Lee is a scam artist, pure and simple.