Court upholds S.F. city worker’s $5 million award

A state appeals court upheld $5 million in damages and attorneys’ fees Thursday to a former San Francisco deputy city attorney who was fired after investigating questionable city payments to plumbing companies.

Joanne Hoeper, an 18year veteran of the office who was then serving as chief trial deputy to City Attorney Dennis Herrera, was removed by Herrera in August 2012 after presenting the findings of her investigation. He transferred her to a temporary position at the district attorney’s office, and then dismissed her from that post in January 2014.

Hoeper had been alerted in December 2011 to a pattern of rising payments by the city to sewer companies for alleged damage to sewer lines by the roots of cityowned trees. She said she determined that the tree roots were not actually harming the sewer lines, that city payments to the companies had soared from $142,000 a year to $4 million in a decade, and that two city attorney staffers had approved dubious payments.

Her report to Herrera said that some plumbing companies were defrauding the city and that San Francisco was paying inflated prices to replace sewers that did not need replacement. Hoeper said she found no evidence of kickbacks or corrupt practices by city employees, but said one staff member was wrongly accepting claims from the plumbing companies rather than the property owners.

Hoeper was distraught about her removal from the office and said she told Herrera she had turned down a job offer from thenAttorney General Kamala Harris in 2011 after Herrera assured her she had a future in the office.

When she sued over her firing, however, the office denied retaliating against her and said Herrera had decided to replace her years earlier for other reasons, compounded by “her exercise of poor judgment in dealing with the investigation.”

But a Superior Court judge found in March 2017 that the dismissal was retaliatory and had violated Hoeper’s rights under the state Whistleblower Protection Act. She was awarded $2.63 million in damages and $2.4 million to reimburse her attorneys.

In Thursday’s ruling, the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco said the evidence “amply supports” the jury’s conclusion that Hoeper’s sewer investigation was a factor in her firing. The court also said the dismissal and the surrounding circumstances effectively ended Hoeper’s 30year legal career, supporting damages for lost income and emotional distress.

On another issue, the court rejected the city’s argument that much of the evidence Hoeper presented should have been excluded because it involved confidential attorneyclient interchanges between Herrera’s office and the city.

San Francisco waived any such confidentiality by releasing parts of its report, including its condemnation of Hoeper’s performance, to The Chronicle and another publication, the Westside Observer, Justice Peter Siggins said in the 30 ruling.

“This decision supports whistleblowers who risk their careers to stand up to corruption in government,” said Hoeper’s lawyers, Karl Olson and Therese Cannata.

John Coté, a spokesman for Herrera, said the case was simply an employment dispute, and that no court had made any finding of corruption.

“Sometimes juries get it wrong, and that’s what happened here,” Coté said in a statement. “It’s unfortunate the court did not recognize that the city attorney had ample legitimate reasons for terminating Ms. Hoeper.”