Ex-school official’s lawsuit claims bias
A former Bridgeport assistant superintendent of schools has sued the city school district, claiming she was laid off because she has a disability and is white.
In her reverse-discrimination federal lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut against the Bridgeport Board of Education, Deborah Santacapita said her position was eliminated while two black assistant superintendents who were less qualified kept their jobs.
The lawsuit states it would not have happened if Santacapita were black.
“Reverse discrimination is really a misnomer,” Thomas Bucci, Santacapita’s attorney said on Tuesday. “Everyone should be treated the same. Discrimination laws are there to protect everyone.”
According to the lawsuit, the city school board and its schools superintendent have a goal to increase the number of minority educators it employs.
“A motivating factor in the defendant’s decision to lay off the plaintiff as opposed to laying off (her two black peers) was its goal of increasing the number of minority educators in its employ,” the lawsuit states.
Bucci said it is one thing when a district is hiring new people to consider the makeup of a community. It is another, when there are terminations, to be cast out because you want to diversify.
Most students in the Bridgeport school district are minorities. The percentage of minority educators in the city’s public
school system hovers around 8 or 9 percent.
The lawsuit states that other than for her race and color, the plaintiff would not have been laid off by the defendant. It cites violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Connecticut Fair Employment Practices Act.
City and Board of Education attorney R. Christopher Meyer and the two black assistant superintendents did not respond to requests for comment Monday.
Schools Superintendent Aresta Johnson declined comment Tuesday.
When Johnson took the job as superintendent in 2017 she hired four assistant superintendents. Subsequent budget cuts forced the elimination of two the following year. One, John Lischner, who was white, left for another job. Janet Brown Clayton and Christina Otuwa, who are black, remain.
Santicapita, before rising to assistant superintendent, had been a teacher, associate principal, principal, and director of assessment, evaluation and research.
The lawsuit maintains that Santacapita, who was employed in various roles at the school district from 1995 to July 2018, informed Johnson in March 2018 that she was suffering from advanced degenerative disc disease and stenosis for which she might need surgery at the beginning of the 2018-19 school year. The disease substantially limits a person’s major life activities, including standing, bending, walking and working.
This is not the first time Bucci has represented Santacapita in a lawsuit against the Bridgeport school district. In 2009, Santacapita sued, saying she was retaliated against in violation of the state’s whistleblower statute when she reported suspected child abuse against then-roosevelt Principal Carmen Perez Dickson.
The suit was dismissed. Dickson would go on to be principal at Tisdale School and was suspended by the district after being caught on tape dragging a kindergarten student down the school’s hallway.
Bucci said this case could take up to two years before there is a trial though discovery, including depositions could start by the end of the calendar year. Santacapita is seeking lost pay and and an unspecified amount in damages.
The case has been assigned to District Judge Janet Bond Arterton in New Haven, Bucci said.