The village of Oak Park and a former employee settled a racial discrimination lawsuit last month, with the village paying $80,000 to close out the 2019 case.
Howard Stokes, who was a longtime worker in the Water and Sewer Division of the Public Works Department, alleged that he was fired by the village in 2018 because of his race. An African American, Stokes was hired in the late 1990s in its streets and sanitation department and then transferred to working in the Water and Sewer Division, where he was promoted to a supervisor in August 2004.
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Stokes filed a charge of discrimination in June 2018 with the Illinois Department of Human Rights, but the following May, the department dismissed Stokes’ complaint for lack of evidence, according to court records. Stokes then filed a lawsuit against the village in Cook County Circuit Court in August 2019.
According to the lawsuit, Stokes alleged that in April 2018, he was confronted by a subordinate — a white senior water plant operator in the — who, without provocation, snatched a piece of paper from Stokes’ hands. Stokes alleged in the lawsuit that when he attempted to get the paper back, his colleague elbowed him several times. After the scuffle, the village immediately suspended Stokes and subsequently fired him, while suspending the other employee for just one day and not firing him.
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Village Attorney Paul Stephanides did not respond to a Pioneer Press request for comment on the settlement.
However, in a response filed in court in 2020, the village alleged that Stokes was fired because he had not met performance expectations as a supervisor, and that he had engaged in misconduct and village policy violations. Then-Village Manager Cara Pavlicek, who made the final decision to fire Stokes, agreed with the human resources director’s recommendation to terminate Stokes, based on violating the village’s policy on abusive language toward a fellow employee, improperly using village telephones for personal use and failing to meet the job expectations.
In addition, a village investigation concluded that during the April 2018 incident, Stokes had chased the senior water plant operator and blocked his exit from a room, which was behavior that was threatening and counterproductive to a safe work environment. Oak Park officials also found that Stokes’ village-issued cell phone had contained photos of guns and photos of Stokes at a shooting range, according to court documents.
In the lawsuit, Stokes alleged that the underling had treated him badly because of Stokes’ race, and he also alleged that racial discrimination was behind the disparity between his punishment and punishments meted out to white employees. In pleadings, Oak Park’s attorneys stated that Stokes’ firing was rooted not in his race, but in his behavior and job performance.
With the case headed for trial earlier this month, with an Oct. 3 date, the two sides opted to settle the suit. Under the terms of the settlement agreement, which Pioneer Press obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, the village continues to maintain that it engaged in no discrimination on any basis and committed no wrongdoing. Oak Park also agreed to pay Stokes a $48,000 lump-sum payment for compensatory damages and another $32,000 in an apparent form of severance, for a total settlement payment to Stokes of $80,000.
In what is a standard clause in such kinds of legal settlement agreements, both parties agreed not to make disparaging statements about the other.
“We are pleased that the village of Oak Park stepped forward to settle and resolve Mr. Stokes’ claims of racial discrimination,” Stokes’ attorney, Michael Leonard, told Pioneer Press. “Unfortunately, it took the pressure of the looming trial date to finally make this happen. Mr. Stokes was a credit to the village and a role model for other employees for more than two decades.”
Stokes had also alleged age discrimination in the complaint filed with the Human Rights department. However, that claim was dropped when the case moved to circuit court, according to the lawsuit.
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Goldsborough is a freelancer.
