New York Post

‘Let’s peek at Pat’s paycheck’

Bias suit vs. NY1

- By PRISCILLA DeGREGORY and REBECCA ROSENBERG

They want to know what’s in the papers.

Five veteran NY1 anchorwome­n who sued the network last year claiming age and gender bias want to see Pat Kiernan’s contract so they can learn how much he makes, new court papers show.

In their bombshell June 2019 lawsuit, Roma Torre, Kristen Shaughness­y, Jeanine Ramirez, Vivian Lee and Amanda Farinacci claimed they were sidelined for younger women and even the local news network’s older male talent like the “In the Papers with Pat Kiernan” host.

Lawyers for Charter Communicat­ions — the parent company of NY1 — said in a Thursday call about informatio­n exchange in the case that the women’s lawyer demanded Charter turn over “Mr. Kiernan’s employment contract the next day,” according to court papers filed in Manhattan federal court Tuesday.

Charter says it can’t turn over the “highly confidenti­al and sensitive” document without a confidenti­ality agreement in place first.

The company says Kiernan’s contract “contains competitiv­e informatio­n about a well-known New York City public figure who is not a party to this case,” according to court papers.

Kiernan is not a defendant in the suit.

But Torre, 61, in particular made claims that Kiernan, 50, was treated like a golden boy at the network, including that he was given a state-of-the-art studio and thrown a huge, 20th anniversar­y bash.

Meanwhile, Torre — who’d been with the network for 25 years — was told to “stop complainin­g” when she noted her much less favorable treatment.

Plaintiff lawyer David Gottlieb told The Post that Kiernan’s contract is just one of many types of documents that they are seeking from the network.

Gottlieb said they believe that “Roma Torre is significan­tly underpaid relative to her comparable male peer — which is Pat Kiernan.”

“They’ve both been at NY1 for more than 25 years. They are both weekday anchors, and our understand­ing and allegation is that Pat Kiernan is paid substantia­lly more than her.”

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