City Councilman: Clerk Emily Lipovan says she was harassed
A Cleveland city councilman said Friday that Emily Lipovan, the council clerk who just resigned, told him months ago that she felt she was sexually harassed by Council President Martin J. Sweeney.
But Sweeney, who this week approved a $56,000 buyout for Lipovan, vehemently denies the allegation. "That's not true," he said in a phone interview Friday.
The councilman, Joe Santiago, who describes himself as a close friend of Lipovan's, said she did not disclose what Sweeney said or did. But Santiago said Lipovan told him she planned to consult an attorney.
A half-dozen other members of council, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said they have heard similar allegations.
On Thursday, Sweeney told The Plain Dealer that the city had agreed to a severance package for Lipovan, who earned $82,000 a year, to give her time to find another job. The deal includes six months of pay plus vacation and comp time.
Council will vote Monday on whether to approve the deal. Sweeney said he expects his colleagues to support it.
The council president said Lipovan left because she wanted a different job.
Lipovan told The Plain Dealer in July she wanted to return to her previous work making business and housing deals in city neighborhoods for local development corporations.
Santiago said Lipovan applied earlier this year for a city manager's job in Oberlin without telling Sweeney. While she never interviewed for the position, her application angered the council president, Santiago said.
Lipovan's attorney Gerald Chattman, who negotiated the severance package with the city, said Friday that his client cannot speak publicly about the payout, or the reasons for it, because she's abiding by a confidentiality clause.
Law Director Bob Triozzi said the agreement is a public record.
Asked about the harassment allegation, Chattman said: "That's precisely what I believe the confidentiality agreement is intended to protect, subjects like that. It would be inappropriate for me to comment."
posted by RonL at 9:55 PM
2 Comments:
The sexual harassment thing is horrible to deal with and the perpetrators of this problem cause serious issues. Having dealt with it myself many years ago, I can tell you from the heart that it is no walk in the park. If Sweeney was a Weenie, then I hope he gets burned.
Sad part is, even if he is guilty as sin, she - as well as her past - will be under the microscope while the "jury is out" on Sweeney should this become a big story.
Additionally pathetic, with the long term memory problem that plague the constituents in Cleveland, Sweeney will probably still be in office long after this has blown over.
Did anyone catch the news? The rest of the council withdrew the severance package in favor of forming a committee, not to see if she was harassed or not, but to see if it was cheaper to just give her the $56K severance package or to fight a lawsuit.
I guess they just don't care if their esteemed leader sexually harasses the employees...or the bad press it brings.
Maybe they just don't care, and that is why Cleveland is rotting from the inside out.
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