Suit alleges illegal firing
Ex-saratoga County official says he defended colleague
Spencer P. Hellwig III, the former longtime Saratoga County administrator, has filed a federal lawsuit against the county alleging he was unlawfully terminated from his job last year after defending the former human resources director, Margaret Mcnamara, who was fired after she leveled workplace discrimination complaints against an elected county supervisor.
Hellwig, 60, who was fired in January 2021, alleges county leaders committed civil and human rights violations by targeting his job; he is seeking reinstatement, compensatory damages, punitive damages, back pay, interest, costs and attorneys’ fees. The lawsuit was filed this week in U.S. District Court in Albany and also names the county Board of Supervisors and Moreau Supervisor Theodore T. Kusnierz Jr., board chairman, as defendants.
Some of the unrest began in April 2020 when Mcnamara filed an internal complaint against Kuznierz alleging gender discrimination and a hostile work environment. Her complaint accused him of engaging in inappropriate conduct that included calling her “madame” in a derogatory tone, criticizing her work privately and in public, and threatening her job.
Kuznierz, 59, referred comment to Christine Rush, the county’s spokeswoman.
“We have not been served with the referenced complaint,” Rush said in a statement. “In the event that we are, we will
continue to vigorously defend the interests of the taxpayers of Saratoga County.”
Mcnamara, who filed a similar wrongful termination lawsuit against the county and Kusnierz in March, has alleged she started getting harassed by Kusnierz not long after he became Moreau’s supervisor in January 2018. She accused him of blaming her for problems with his state retirement account and said he had remarked she “doesn’t know how to do her job,” although his pension issues were not her responsibility.
There also was tension among the county’s high-level officials after Mcnamara and Hellwig, who was appointed county administrator in 2010, established a system in March 2020 to pay “essential” employees time-and-a-half for working regular hours during the pandemic. In seeking that authorization, Mcnamara allegedly told the Board of Supervisors Law and Finance Committee that “every municipality is doing it,” although that was not accurate.
The extra pay system was
later rescinded. But Mcnamara alleges in her federal complaint that Kusnierz, who became chairman in January 2021, became “extremely offensive and retaliatory” and “threatened to address alleged performance concerns prior to COVID-19, although plaintiff’s performance was exemplary and never subject to negative review.”
Kusnierz also called for her resignation and allegedly told Hellwig and then-chairman Preston Allen that she “better apologize or this would not go away.”
Hellwig’s federal complaint alleges he witnessed some of the remarks directed at Mcnamara by Kusnierz and that he had encouraged her to file a complaint.
The county subsequently hired two private law firms to conduct investigations of Mcnamara’s workplace allegations as well as the handling of the pandemic pay raises. Kusnierz hired private counsel to represent him against Mcnamara’s complaints and Hellwig rejected his request to have the county pay for those legal services, heightening the tensions between the supervisor and Hellwig.
“Kusnierz viewed Mr. Hellwig’s refusal to authorize the payment for legal fees as an act of solidarity in support of Mcnamara’s internal complaint against Kusnierz,” Hellwig’s complaint states, adding that when he was interviewed by the attorneys investigating Mcnamara’s complaints he confirmed witnessing much of the alleged misconduct.
“The county and board also knew that Mr. Hellwig had supported Mcnamara in his interview, as he did publicly during board meetings,” the federal complaint added. “Further ... the Board of Supervisors and the county later received a copy of the investigative report, which summarized Mr. Hellwig’s interview. Following the investigation, Kusnierz and his political allies on the board ... made clear that they intended to retaliate against Mr. Hellwig, Mcnamara, and other county employees for participating in the ... investigation.”
In August 2020, two months after Hellwig was interviewed by the investigators, Kuznierz offered a motion at a Board of Supervisors’ meeting to terminate the county administrator.
During that meeting, Waterford Supervisor John E. Lawler had
cautioned Kuznierz that what he was doing was not appropriate or in line with county protocols. Kuznierz allegedly refused to detail his reasons for seeking Hellwig’s termination.
“You may have the votes, but shame on you,” Lawler told Kuznierz during the meeting. “And the lawsuit that is sure to follow, you will have earned it. You will have earned it and the taxpayers of this county will end up paying.”
The lawsuit claims Kuznierz and his political allies on the board subsequently formed a committee to investigate the pandemic-pay system as a pretext to terminate Hellwig. Sixteen months ago, Kuznierz was elected chairman of the board; at a meeting that same day he proffered a resolution to terminate Hellwig from his $156,000-ayear position.
The resolution firing Hellwig, which passed, added that the board, “wishes to express its gratitude for Mr. Hellwig’s 33 years of dedicated service to the county and wishes him all good intentions with regard to his future endeavors.”
Hellwig is being represented in the case by Benjamin W. Hill, an attorney in Albany. Hill declined comment.