Benton fire district pays $540K to settle lawsuit with its 1st woman hired as paramedic

A Benton County fire district paid $540,000 to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit with the first woman to work for it as a firefighter and paramedic.

Benton County Fire District 1 paid Samantha Ward for lost wages, damages and her attorney fees as part of the settlement agreement.

The settlement agreement says the fire district does not admit to any wrongdoing but it ends the civil suit started in 2023 after the district fired Ward.

Ward and her attorney Matthew Grotty claimed the district engaged in years of belittling behavior, sexual harassment and discrimination that started shortly after she was hired and lasted for the more than two years she worked for the district.

The fire district then ignored its progressive discipline policies and fired Ward by finding two employees to claim she was “mean to them,” court documents claimed.

The settlement came after the employees changed their stories, according to the suit.

“It was one of the most brazen cases I’ve ever seen,” Grotty told the Tri-City Herald. “They predicated (the firing) on very misleading if not false statements. .... It was baseless. Samantha Ward is still a very competent firefighter and paramedic.”

The district also agreed to reinstate her, and wrote a letter of recommendation that lauded Ward for her work setting up the district’s Advanced Life Support service.

“FF Ward has been an asset to our fire district and has met several fire and EMS expectations,” they wrote. “FF Ward played an important role in the development of our ambulance transport program, and she spent countless hours training all of our members across seven stations in EMS operations.”

Benton County Fire District 1 declined to comment on the agreement.

The fire district previously denied the allegations in court documents, and said previous independent investigations showed there was no discrimination.

They previously issued a statement saying the district “has a long-standing tradition of training and employing a diverse group of volunteer and career firefighters and paramedics.”

The district is a public agency funded by tax dollars and staffed by a combination of volunteers and career firefighters. Its board is publicly elected.

The district covers 320 square miles and provides firefighting, ambulance and hazardous materials responses to areas south of Kennewick and Richland through Finley, El Rancho Reata, Triple Vista and Badger Canyon.

Harassment and discrimination

For the three years Ward worked there, she said she was belittled and insulted, and in one case threatened. She was also passed over for training opportunities and promotions because of her gender, claiming the mistakes and bad behavior of a less qualified man were ignored, said the lawsuit.

At the same time, she said the now former fire Chief Lonnie Click allegedly tried to have a personal relationship with her. She said he hugged her at inappropriate times for uncomfortably long, invited her to “drink with him in lieu of counseling” and had her park her emergency vehicle closer to his.

When she rebuffed those advances, she lost positions of authority, the lawsuit claimed.

She said problems started just a month after she was hired in 2020 and lasted through 2023.

When she went to her commanders several times to raise concerns about her treatment, her concerns were often dismissed as gossiping. Even when they were taken seriously, the people in charge, including now Fire Chief Scott LoParco, allegedly refused to investigate, court documents said.

She reported that women were told that they “only advance because they are signed off by people who like women” and women looked “unprofessional” in uniform.

The same man reportedly said women should be more like his wife who had food ready for him when he got home.

Escalating problems

While problems were ignored with her male co-workers, Ward’s attorney noted that the scrutiny on her was unfairly applied. One example came during her “six-month” evaluation that happened more than a year after she was hired.

She was blamed in connection with a fire that nearly killed her. She had never been disciplined about it previously.

“Male paramedics stand by and let patients nearly die and bully subordinates into falsifying reports and do not get written up (they get promoted instead). Female paramedics allegedly ‘gossip’ about male coworkers and get written up,” Ward’s attorney said in the complaint.

When Ward hired an attorney in March 2022 and complained about discrimination and harassment for the fifth time, the district responded by hiring an attorney to conduct its own investigation.

Grotty said the attorney was known more for defending government agencies from gender discrimination complaints. His investigation only found a problem with Click’s communications with Ward.

The district then moved her to a work shift with fewer chances for advancement. She was also denied the chance for more training.

After filing a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the retaliation allegedly increased. It included not giving her a chance to become a lieutenant by refusing to let her respond to fire calls needed for a certification.

She filed a claim against the district’s insurance in August 2022. This is a necessary step before filing a lawsuit.

Maternity leave and firing

Ward told her employer that she was pregnant in November 2022. About the same time, she was given a performance evaluation that was a year late.

In it she was told that she needs to focus on “creating positive relationships with both the career and volunteer (staff) of BCFD #1,” the complaint said.

“Complaining of sexual harassment and whistleblowing certainly does not ‘create positive relationships’ in the workplace,” Grotty said in the report.

Ward was told in December 2022 that she wouldn’t get a pay upgrade for her position because of “pregnancy-related limited duty modifications,” the complaint said.

She tried to go through mediation in February of that year, but it failed to be resolved. So she filed a lawsuit on March 24, 2023, and then went on maternity leave.

She started to return to work in July, and then was told that she needed to talk to the district’s attorney. When she showed up on Aug. 16, 2023, she was placed on administrative leave. She hadn’t received any discipline notice until that point. This was a violation of the district’s policies.

The district based its claims on two witnesses. One never worked with Ward and the other hadn’t worked with her for a year, according to court documents.

The commissioners agreed to fire Ward in a split vote.