Ansonia Aldermen voted Tuesday to pay the city’s longtime library director $1,500 and some unused vacation time to settle a lawsuit she had filed last year alleging unfair treatment as a result of being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
In exchange, the library director, Joyce Ceccarelli, will drop her lawsuit and retire this year. She will transition from director to the role of “consultant” and work fewer hours.
As part of the settlement, the city will also pay for most of Ceccarelli’s health insurance costs until she’s eligible for Medicare. The city will also cut a $10,000 check to Ceccarelli’s lawyer to pay for her legal costs.
Ceccarelli has worked at the library since 1995.
In 1999, she requested the city provide “reasonable accommodation” for her because she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
“Reasonable accommodation” is a phrase from the Americans with Disabilities Act, a 1990 federal law which compels employers to make changes to the work place or adjustments to the job to help an employee do his or her duties.
The accommodations could “range from making the physical work environment accessible, (to) providing a flexible work schedule or providing assistive equipment,” according to the state Department of Labor.
For Ceccarelli, those accommodations included flexible work hours and the ability to work from home.
In her lawsuit, filed last June, Ceccarelli said the city had initially provided her such accommodation.
But that changed in 2011, Ceccarelli alleged in the lawsuit, when Tara Kolakowski was hired as the city’s personnel director.
Kolakowski was hired under former Mayor James Della Volpe’s administration. Prior to working for the city, Kolakowski was an Alderman.
The lawsuit alleged Kolakowski “harassed and reprimanded” Ceccarelli due to her disease.
Ceccarelli told the Valley Indy last year there was no personal animosity between her and Kolakowski, and that she always got good performance reviews.
But she said the city reneged on accommodations it agreed to in 1999, such as leaving the library to work from home if she felt sick.
The lawsuit alleged Ceccarelli’s situation didn’t change after Della Volpe was defeated for re-election in November 2013 and Kolakowski was replaced as personnel director.
Aldermen voted unanimously to settle Ceccarelli’s lawsuit Tuesday (March 10) after discussing the matter behind closed doors.
The secret discussion is legal under the Freedom of Information Act, which allows public agencies to exclude the public when discussing pending litigation.
The settlement, a copy of which is posted below, calls on Ceccarelli to drop her lawsuit in exchange for retiring and working reduced hours as a consultant at the library.
Ceccarelli submitted a retirement letter effective June 30 as part of the agreement, but the settlement says she can retire on or before March 19 and work until June 30 as a consultant working up to 19 hours per week at a rate of $30 per hour.
Until she retires, Ceccarelli will be allowed to work two hours per day from home, and agreed to use sick, vacation, or personal days when she can’t report to the library.
The settlement calls on the city to allow Ceccarelli to carry over 390 hours of accrued vacation time and pay 100 percent of her unused sick and vacation time when she does retire.
The city will pay 88.5 percent of Ceccarelli’s medical insurance costs until she becomes eligible for Medicare, and will also give Ceccarelli $1,500 “in settlement of her claim for emotional distress damages.”
Aldermen voted to accept the settlement Tuesday without any public discussion of its specifics. Neither Ceccarelli nor her lawyer were present for the meeting.
Afterward, the city’s corporation counsel, John Marini, said the agreement ends Ceccarelli’s battle with the city on “pretty mutually agreeable terms.”
“We wish her well,” he said. “She’s been a credit to Ansonia during her time, she’s served the library very well, and we all wish her the best.”
“We were dealing with a situation that was created by a past administration,” he added.
