Johnson lineman alleges harassment by coworkers

The village suspended Stankiewicz in 2021 pending an investigation but laid him off before it was completed, even though his contract clearly stipulates that layoffs must start with the most junior employee in the department. Stankiewicz is one of three first-class linemen working for the village utility.

Last month, an independent arbitrator ruled the village violated Stankiewicz’s contract and forced his reinstatement with back pay and benefits.

Stankiewicz’s allegations were detailed in the arbitrator’s opinion and award, a document the village refused to release to the public even after trustee Diane Lehouiller publicly shared it at a meeting in February.

Troy Dolan has denied allegations he encouraged a years-long harassment campaign against Stankiewicz. And, though his resignation is effective this week, he’s already planning to return to work as a contracted consultant, a role his wife played for nine months after she first resigned as village manager last June. She terminated her contract earlier this month.

“Since announcing my resignation, I have been contacted by multiple people expressing concern about the continuation of important ongoing projects. I have offered to assist the village on a temporary contractual basis with a portion of my former duties to make sure village residents and customers continue to receive the service they need and deserve. Regarding my workplace safety concerns, this work would be done remotely,” Troy Dolan said.

Village trustees considered Dolan’s offer at a meeting Wednesday after press time.

Harassment allegations

Stankiewicz started as a first-class lineman in the village of Johnson in August 2016 after spending 20 years with a large utility in New York.

What followed over the next five years, according to the lineman, was a steady stream of verbal abuse from his coworkers and “comments aimed at getting under his skin,” according to the arbitration report.

The report details incidents where coworkers referred to Stankiewicz as “slow” and used slurs meant to insult his intelligence. According to Stankiewicz, Troy Dolan not only didn’t intervene, but he actively encouraged it.

“We’ll have to step up the pressure to wear him down,” Dolan once told the other lineman, according to Stankiewicz.

Stankiewicz accused his former boss of being a poor leader who failed to deal with the interpersonal conflict in the department, an accusation that led Dolan to react with anger.

With Dolan refusing to intervene and possibly encouraging the behavior, Stankiewicz’s harassers grew emboldened, the report read. At one point, a coworker carelessly backed a village-owned truck into his personal vehicle and totaled it; the coworker claimed it was an accident.

“I have never seen any evidence of vehicle vandalism. Over five years ago, Paul’s car was damaged in an accident with a piece of village equipment,” Dolan said in a statement. “I took all appropriate steps to report the accident to the sheriff and to the village’s insurance carrier to ensure Paul (Stankiewicz) was compensated for the damage.”

Last May, the tire valve stem was cut on Stankiewicz’s car while he was parked at work. Stankiewicz claimed he knew which coworker vandalized his car and called then-manager Meredith Dolan to file a complaint, just as his contract with the village required him to do.

“Vehicle vandalism to get me to move is the end of the game,” Stankiewicz said in that phone call.

Meredith Dolan perceived the comment as a threat, even after Stankiewicz called the following morning to apologize and say, “I’m not a violent person.”

The village suspended Stankiewicz with pay pending an investigation and the couple filed a restraining order.

“The suggestion that I harassed or encouraged harassment by other employees is baseless and false. I am proud of my record of accomplishment with the village, including great working relationships with other staff, customers and residents. Unfortunately, being a strong leader who set and enforced high expectations for performance has made me a target,” according to a statement from Troy Dolan.

Arbitration

Instead of letting investigation surrounding Stankiewicz’s alleged threat against the Dolans play out, village trustees moved in August 2021 to institute a layoff of village linemen that only included Stankiewicz.

According to board chair William Jennison, the justification was that the department ran smoothly without Stankiewicz and would save the village money.

Dolan laid off Stankiewicz instead of apprentice lineman Chandler Bullard, who had less seniority, even though Stankiewicz’s contract stipulates that, “Whenever all other factors are somewhat equal, the employees with the most seniority shall be recalled first, and the employee with the least seniority shall be laid off first.”

Village trustees could have justified their removal of Stankiewicz by attempting to prove that Bullard was the more qualified lineman, but he did not appear at the arbitration hearing and the village didn’t provide evaluations of Bullard’s performance.

Stankiewicz was the third highest paid lineman, according to public records obtained by the News & Citizen.

Dolan rated Stankiewicz’s performance as satisfactory in 2018 but said he had received complaints from four customers.

Dolan never disciplined or wrote up Stankiewicz for these complaints.

During the arbitration, Dolan criticized Stankiewicz’s lack of communication with the public and coworkers and accused him of taking too long to plow village sidewalks. Stankiewicz claimed he was just being careful not to plow into cars and driveways.

Jennison supported Dolan during the arbitration and his assertions that Stankiewicz was a poor communicator. Jennison also claimed Stankiewicz called him after he was laid off to complain about Dolan and his coworkers.

“There was Paul’s way to do things,” Jennison said. “He doesn’t listen to other employees; he would have an attitude when told how to do things.”

Back pay and benefits

After testimony from Stankiewicz, Dolan and Jennison, neutral arbitrator Michael Stutz ruled in early February that the village violated the lineman’s contract and reinstated him with back pay and benefits.

Stankiewicz’s threat against the Dolans was dismissed, with Stutz writing that “there was little evidence of the alleged threat.”

This led to Stutz’s determination that laying off Stankiewicz from his job violated his contract, noting that the village did not show Bullard was exceptionally more qualified than Stankiewicz.

Stutz chastised the board of trustees for relying instead on Dolan’s “questionable verbal assessments.”

“Mr. Dolan’s part in the departmental dysfunction made him less than objective as a source of information,” Stutz wrote. “The history of unaddressed personality conflicts, harassment and dysfunction in the department does not justify violating the soul of the labor agreement, and (Stankiewicz’s) seniority rights.”

Dolan told the News & Citizen last week that his resignation was due to multiple statements he perceived to be threats against him and his family and accused unnamed trustees of not taking the matter seriously enough.

According to Lehouiller and trustee B.J. Putvain, the board had no choice but to allow Stankiewicz’s return to work following the arbitrator’s decision, which set the stage for the conflict that led to the departures of both Dolans.

Aside from not adequately making the case that the layoff was justified, the village also rejected a settlement offer, according to Stankiewicz, which would have allowed the village to move on without bringing him back to work.

The village responded with a lower counteroffer, which Stankiewicz rejected.

Tale of two letters

Despite providing Meredith Dolan’s resignation letter to the public, the village continues to refuse to release a similar letter from her husband.

At a special meeting March 25, village trustees failed to reconsider the initial denial made by village clerk Rosemary Audibert to release Troy Dolan’s resignation letter on the advice of the village’s lawyers, Monaghan Safar Ducham.

In her denial, Audibert cited an exemption in Vermont public records law that broadly applies to personnel.

But according to the newspaper’s attorney, the court has previously ruled that “the exception applies only to those documents that reveal intimate details of a person’s life, including any information that might subject the person to embarrassment, harassment, disgrace, or loss of employment or friends,” and that this standard clearly does not apply in this case.

While village trustee Ken Tourangeau made a motion to deny the News & Citizen’s appeal of Audibert’s ruling, no other trustee would second the motion.

Instead, they simply failed to take any action and said they would seek a second opinion on the matter from the League of Cities and Towns, a statewide lobbying group for municipalities, after it was suggested by former Johnson Selectboard member Kyle Nuse.

This story was updated April 13 to reflect that Paul Stankiewicz is Johnson village’s third highest paid lineman, not second as reported. He is also not the village’s only first-class lineman; he is one of three.