Homel v. Centennial Sch. Dist.

Decision Date21 December 2011
Docket NumberCivil Action No. 11–1996.
PartiesSandy M. HOMEL v. CENTENNIAL SCHOOL DISTRICT, et al.
CourtU.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

Anita F. Alberts, Doylestown, PA, for Sandy M. Homel.

Craig D. Ginsburg, Kevin Joseph McCloskey, Michael I. Levin, Levin Legal Group, Huntingdon Valley, PA, for Centennial School District, et al.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

SAVAGE, District Judge.

In her meandering “shotgun complaint,” 1 Sandy Homel makes claims based on a multitude of legal theories against her former employer, Centennial School District (“CSD”). She alleges First Amendment retaliation under § 1983; sex discrimination under § 1983, Title VII, and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (PHRA); retaliation for filing sex discrimination complaints under Title VII and the PHRA; and age discrimination under the ADEA and the PHRA. Each of her counts incorporates by reference all the allegations of its predecessors, leaving to us the onerous task of matching each of her several years worth of factual allegations with a cause of action.

CSD has moved for summary judgment on all counts. For the purpose of considering CSD's motion for summary judgment, we consider Homel's arguments in her response to the motion as best we can identify them.

We hold that CSD is entitled to summary judgment on Homel's First Amendment and ADEA claims. Homel has, however, established that there are triable issues of fact related to her sex discrimination and Title VII/PHRA retaliation claims. Therefore, we shall grant in part and deny in part the summary judgment motion.

Background

The last several years have been tumultuous ones for Centennial School District's administration. The district has had four superintendents in four years, and its school board has been divided by political factions and personal quarrels. Sandy Homel found herself at the center of much of this imbroglio.

The school district is divided into three geographic regions: Warminster, Warminster/Ivyland (collectively, the “Warminster regions”), and Southampton. Three of the school board's nine members are elected from each of these three regions. As a result, six of the board members are elected from the Warminster regions and three from Southampton.

The divide between the Warminster and Southampton board members is more than a matter of geography. According to the testimony of several school board members and district administrators, the board members have formed factions that often split along regional lines. On a number of issues, the board is divided roughly between the six members of the Warminster majority and the three members of the Southampton minority. One such issue is Sandy Homel.

Homel began her career with CSD in 1997 when she was hired as director of secondary education. She has held a number of administrative positions during her tenure. In 2006, CSD promoted Assistant Superintendent Michael Masko to become superintendent in July 2007. Prior to Masko officially assuming the superintendency, Homel interviewed with him for the position of assistant superintendent. To Homel's surprise, Masko offered her a different position—assistant to the superintendent. No one at CSD had held this position before, and it carried a lower salary than assistant superintendent. Unlike assistant superintendent, the position of assistant to the superintendent is not created by the Pennsylvania School Code. According to Homel, no woman had served as assistant superintendent at CSD.2 Despite her misgivings, Homel accepted the assistant to the superintendent position. 3

Seven months later, CSD offered to promote Homel to assistant superintendent. CSD first gave Homel a copy of Masko's old assistant superintendent contract to review because hers was not ready. When Homel received her own contract, she was surprised to find a “termination without cause” provision that was not in Masko's contract. According to Homel, CSD denied her any opportunity to negotiate the contract or to have it reviewed by an attorney, and informed her that the school board would not ratify her contract without the “termination without cause” provision.4 Homel accepted the promotion to assistant superintendent.

In February and March of 2008—shortly into Homel's tenure as assistant superintendent—school board member Mark Miller, a member of the Southampton minority, approached Homel on at least two occasions and asked her about the purchase of a large kiln for the high school's art department. The kiln purchase allegedly had been made at Masko's direction while he served as assistant superintendent. Miller was apparently concerned that Masko had purchased the kiln without the school board's approval and without following the mandatory bidding procedures for making such purchases. Miller also thought it suspicious that Masko's wife was a teacher in the art department when the kiln was purchased.

Homel agreed with Miller that the purchase appeared suspicious, and eventually provided Miller with a paper record of the transaction. Homel did not bring this information to the full school board, but only worked through Miller. Miller and fellow board member Cynthia Mueller—also a member of the Southampton minority—apparently took the lead on investigating the kiln purchase. Masko resigned as superintendent in June 2008, allegedly at the behest of the school board.

Homel claims that the board members in the Warminster majority disapproved of her actions during Miller's investigation and wanted to damage her career at CSD. She claims that some board members blamed her for Masko's resignation because they believed she was disloyal in revealing his potential wrongdoing. She also claims that members of the Warminster majority were angry for her working through two members of the Southampton minority, rather than bringing the issue to the full board. In her view, the Warminster majority believed that she was aligned with Miller and Mueller to undermine its power.

The board appointed Homel acting superintendent in July 2008. Homel claims that, during her tenure in February 2009, school board member Jane Lynch approached her with a quid pro quo arrangement. According to Homel, Lynch asked her for help in getting her grandchild into kindergarten, even though the grandchild was too young to make the cutoff age. Homel testified that Lynch, knowing that Homel hoped to become full-time superintendent, offered to help her get the school board votes she needed in exchange for the favor.5 Homel claims that she rejected the offer and informed the school board president Thomas Reinboth, but that Reinboth failed to take any action.

Homel interviewed for the full-time superintendent position in early 2009. Shortly thereafter, she was informed that the school board had decided to hire another candidate. Three board members voted for and six board members voted against her application to move beyond the initial interview stage. Miller and Mueller of Southampton were two of the board members who voted for Homel.6 The school board then unanimously selected Thomas Turnbaugh, who had served as superintendent of another district, to become CSD's superintendent. Homel continued to serve as acting superintendent throughout the 20082009 school year and until August 2009, when Turnbaugh officially took over.

The parties disagree on why Homel was not selected for superintendent in 2009. According to CSD, the board members preferred Turnbaugh in part because he, unlike Homel, had a doctorate and had prior experience as a superintendent in another district. Homel argues that Turnbaugh's doctorate is pretext because at least two previous superintendents did not have one. Instead, she argues that the school board's decision was politically motivated. She says that she could not garner the five votes she needed because of the fallout from the kiln purchase incident and her refusal to accept Lynch's quid pro quo. She believes that a majority of the board had turned against her.

The district denies that either the kiln purchase controversy or her allegations against Lynch had anything to do with the board's decision not to promote her. It does not dispute that Homel became entangled in board politics. CSD claims that the board members who voted against her believed that she had become a divisive figure in the district's administration. They felt that she had aligned herself with the Southampton minority—particularly Miller and Mueller—to the detriment of the full board. They believed that she regularly met with and provided informationto Miller and Mueller without sharing it with the other board members.

The tumult within CSD's administration continued under Turnbaugh. The district's business manager, human resources manager, special education supervisor, and facilities engineering and services director left during his tenure. Two female administrators filed internal complaints against him. One of those administrators was Donna Dunar, who claimed that Turnbaugh had sexually harassed her. During the pendency of this action, Dunar filed a federal suit against CSD, Turnbaugh, and board member Andrew Pollock for sex discrimination, sexual harassment, and retaliation. Dunar has filed an affidavit in support of Homel in this case.

Homel claims that Turnbaugh regularly embarrassed her, berated her, undermined her authority, excluded her, and devalued her work. On January 7, 2010, Turnbaugh reminded her that, under her contract, she could be terminated without cause. The next day, Turnbaugh informed her that she was being removed from her position and placed on leave with pay. The following Monday, Turnbaugh handed her a letter stating that she was being placed on administrative leave under the “no cause termination” provision of her contract.

Homel quickly filed an internal “hostile environment” complaint against Turnbaugh. She claims that, in keeping with its practice of not taking women's discrimination...

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