RIOC Board Of Directors Meeting December 13, Approval Of Budget, Chief Operating Officer Position Appointment And Pending Litigation On Agenda - The Circus Continues With Update On RIOC President And General Counsel Racial Discrimination Lawsuit Against Governor Hochul's Staff, NY State Officials, RIOC And RIOC Director

The Roosevelt Island Operating Corp (RIOC) Board of Directors will meet in person Wednesday December 13 at 5:30 PM in the Good Shepherd Community Center (543 Main Street) beginning at 5:30 PM.

 You're invited to attend,  ask questions and share concerns about Roosevelt Island during the opening Public Session before the start of the meeting. Sign up to speak here.

Among the items on the agenda for the December 13 RIOC Board meeting are:   

... V. New Business

1. Approval of the Proposed RIOC Budget for Fiscal Year 2024-25 (Board Action Required)...

3. Appointment of Mary Cunneen to the Position of Vice President of Operations/Chief Operating Officer of the Corporation (Board Action Required)...

VI. Chair’s Motion for Executive Session to Discuss:

a. proposed, pending or current litigation; and

b. the medical, financial, credit or employment history of a particular person or corporation, or matters leading to the appointment, employment, promotion, demotion, discipline, suspension, dismissal or removal of a particular person or corporation....

The appointment of Ms Cuneen as RIOC Chief Operating Officer was on the November 14 RIOC Board Agenda but was not approved at that time. RIOC Board members asked questions regarding:

• Ms Cuneen's qualifications for the position, 
• her previous refusal to speak with and answer questions by RIOC Board members exercising their oversight function,
• accuracy of her resume and
• whether an executive search process was conducted for the position.

Ms Cuneen's appointment discussion was moved from a public session to Executive Session without the public being allowed to attend. Following the Executive Session, there was no announcement  of any appointment to the Chief Operating Officer position. Ms Cuneen is currently the Acting Chief Operating Officer.

Also, the upcoming December 13 Executive Session agenda item regarding litigation may have to do with an update to the racial discrimination  lawsuit brought last Septmenber by RIOC President Shelton Haynes

 and General Counsel Gretchen Robinson against:

... members of NY State Governor Kathy Hochul's Executive Chamber as well as the Commissioner, General Counsel and Deputy Counsel of the NY State Division of Homes and Community Renewal.

Though not named as defendants in the lawsuit, Mr Haynes and Ms Robinson claim in their lawsuit that NY State Senator Liz Krueger, NY State Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright and Roosevelt Island Daily publisher David Stone contributed to a "racist backlash" against them.

The lawsuit also claims that Mr Haynes and Ms Robinson were excluded from the appointment process of 3 new RIOC Board Members in an attempt to undermine their authority and "ability to discharge their job functions." Haynes and Robinson claim the 3 new RIOC board members are antagonistic to them....

On December 8, Mr Haynes and Ms Robertson filed an amended complaint 

adding the Executive Chamber for the Office Governor Of NY, RIOC and recently appointed RIOC Board Director Ben Fhala (pictured on right at November 14 RIOC Board Meeting) as defendants to their lawsuit. 

 According to this excerpt from the Haynes/Robertson amended complaint:

PRELIMINARY STATEMENT

1. This is a case about how the Executive Chamber for the Office of the Governor of New York (the “Chamber”) and the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (“RIOC”) have unfairly subjected Shelton J. Haynes and Gretchen K. Robinson (“Robinson,” and together with Haynes, the “Plaintiffs”), two African American executives, to continuous and pervasive discrimination by, including but not limited to, subjecting Haynes and Robinson to frequent unwarranted investigations by the New York State Inspector General (“NYSIG”) as well as ordering an independent investigation by an outside counsel—something not done for other, more serious allegations—based entirely on specious allegations of wrongdoing. The Chamber did so while simultaneously thwarting Haynes’s and Robinson’s efforts to fight back against the discrimination and defend themselves and RIOC against a multitude of defamatory statements made by a local blogger and a group of disgruntled former employees. After a seven-month investigation by an outside counsel—an investigation that was wholly out of step with prior practice of the RIOC Board of Directors (the “RIOC Board”) and referred to by one RIOC Board Member as a “f****** racist witch hunt”—State officials close to the Governor, led by Defendants Alejandro Valella (“Valella,” who provided updates to the Chamber on the investigation) and Diana Lopez (“Lopez”) intentionally delayed outside counsel’s publication of a report that exonerated Plaintiffs of wrongdoing, and instructed outside counsel to sanitize the first draft of the report to remove and cover up the findings that confirmed and supported Plaintiffs’ ongoing complaints of experiencing racial discrimination while working at RIOC. Other Chamber officials, including Defendants Roger Maldonado (“Maldonado”), Tania Dissanayake (“Dissanayake”), RuthAnne Visnauskas (“Visnauskas”), and Lopez, who were aware of the discrimination findings in the report, have discriminated and retaliated against Plaintiffs by, among other means: (1) installing RIOC Board Members (Ben Fhala (“Fhala”) and Lydia Tang (“Tang”)) —who, from the beginning of their board tenures, have been antagonistic to Plaintiffs—without consulting Plaintiffs (a departure from prior practice); and (2) preventing existing RIOC Board Members—who are supportive of Haynes and Robinson—from filling committee vacancies. Moreover, since Plaintiffs filed this lawsuit, Defendants have continued—and even escalated— their unwarranted targeting of Plaintiffs by initiating yet another frivolous investigation into them, interfering with their ability to do their jobs, and criticizing them to the media. Through their actions, Defendants have also subjected Plaintiffs to a hostile work environment. In doing so, they have made their message to Plaintiffs clear: GET OUT....

During the November 14 RIOC Board meeting public session, I asked:

How can the Roosevelt Island community be assured that RIOC will operate efficiently and competently when it's President and General Counsel are suing the Governor's staff?  

There was no response to my question although Plaintiffs Haynes and Robinson did appear to have frequent, friendly and amicable conversation with defendants Visnauskas 

and Valella 

during the November 14 RIOC Board meeting.

You can read the entire amended complaint here.

The RIOC management circus continues. Stay tuned for more.