School, demoted principal in tussle
San Rafael City Schools and a former principal are jousting over evidence in his lawsuit alleging an unlawful demotion.
Lawyers for the school district and Juan Rodriguez, the former head of Venetia Valley School, reported for a case management hearing Tuesday in Marin County Superior Court. The attorneys told Judge James Chou they were in a dispute over the scope of documents demanded by the plaintiff.
The number of relevant district files and emails Rodriguez is seeking could yield 1 million documents or more, said Ilana Kohn, the lawyer for the school district.
“We can’t even fit that on our server,” she told the judge. “The plaintiff was employed in that job for almost a decade. There are privacy issues. He interacted with many, many workers.”
Chou set another hearing for June 29 for the litigants to report their progress.
Rodriguez sued the district and various officials after he was demoted to a teacher’s position last March. He alleges defamation, retaliation and discrimination.
The district, in a Feb. 26 response brief, denies the allegations — including accusations of slander against the school board and Jim Hogeboom, the district superintendent.
Rodriguez alleged the demotion, which was publicly announced, defamed him and prevented him from getting new work. Rodriguez, who is on paid sick leave from the district, is demanding compensatory and punitive damages, reinstatement in the job and penalties against the district.
Rodriguez’s demotion triggered outrage by families, neighbors and community members who said he was their hero and that he stood up for the rights of Latinos. Many testified to numerous awards granted to Rodriguez for his advocacy work and for upgrading educational quality at Venetia Valley.
But some teachers who had worked under Rodriguez said he had an abrasive management style that caused them harm. Some testified they had asked to be transferred out of Venetia Valley because of that.
Rodriguez’s complaint
alleges that district officials were upset with him because he “objected to policies that he reasonably believed were illegal acts of discrimination toward the students and staff members based on their race, ethnicity and national origin.”
According to the latest available enrollment data from the 2019-20 school year, Latino students
comprise 70% of the elementary school district and 87% of Venetia Valley School.
The district’s denial says it “exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct promptly any allegedly harassing and/or discriminatory behavior, and that plaintiff unreasonably failed to take advantage of any preventive or corrective opportunities provided by
SRCS or to avoid harm otherwise.”
As to the defamation allegations against Hogeboom and the trustees at the time — Rachel Kertz, Maika Llorens Gulati, Linda Jackson, Greg Knell and Natu Tuatagaloa — the court dropped them as defendants. The district said they are immune from liability under state code that protects public employees.