What Workplace Violence Committee?
Back in June 2022, Washoe County Manager Eric Brown, submitted a request to fund a Legal Aid program for employees of the county. This fund, not to exceed $150,000.00 annually, is designed to pay legal fees and for public relations firms to help with reputation management should a county employee fall victim to certain unfair harassment. The matter was brought before the County Commission and only Jeanne Herman opposed the matter. The decisions as to whether a county employee is deserving of the assistance lies solely with the county manager. The public was assured the funds only apply to employees and not elected officials.
Despite the Washoe County Manager purporting Washoe County employees are and were subject all sort of threat and harassment, the county cannot produce evidence of one meeting, the names of any of the principles on this claimed Work Place Violence Committee or any agenda. Most telling, the County cannot produce one sustained allegation in the last TWO YEARS that involved a citizen harassing an employee. Mr. Brown, we are not sure how it worked in corporate California, however here in Nevada we like evidence, some semblance of proof to support your open checkbook to fund employees and their Public Relations needs. In fairness, the county did supply a policy from 2013, which states that when an employee needs a restraining order, the district attorney will submit, on behalf of the employee, which is at no cost to the county or the employee. So we continue to wonder, what is this fund for?
As our readers may recall, in a contentious and heavily opposed action, Washoe County ignored public comment and approved Eric Brown to be the sole arbiter in matters of employees feeling threatened by citizens. At the time, Brown was quoted as saying, ““We have had situations where county employees – not elected officials – have received death threats, have received malicious and fictitious claims made against them," he said. "Some of this has been extremely hurtful to their families.” Following our public records request, the county cannot produce evidence to back the claims of Brown, something that might have been prudent to do prior to handing him an unsupervised $150,000 checkbook.
This issue apparently stemmed from heated meetings following Covid lockdowns and restrictions and the election integrity issues brought forth by many citizens. Rather than living in the arena of transparency and cooperation, County management appears content to play Monarchy as evidenced by their response to our request.
The request, submitted earlier in July 2022, asked for the following items, all of which are subject to inspection under Nevada Law:
The current make-up (list of members) of the Washoe County Workplace Violence Committee (WCWVC)
The policy and guiding documents that created the WCWVC
The agenda(s) for the last 24 months for the WCWVC for any and all meetings
List of sustained allegations found by the WCWVC during the last 24 months that did NOT involve WC employees as the involved parties, meaning matters not between employees
What we can tell our readers, during a recent meeting where the vote was certified from the primary, an unidentified county employee exited his chair in the commission chambers, during the meeting and aggressively approached a woman who had given public comment. He was angry and yelled something at her as he leaned toward her, waging his finger and then stormed out of the meeting. Fellow employee, Marilyn Kramer, who had been the assistant to the prior county manager, retired and came back to work in the registrars office, looked on with a smile. We wonder if he will face any discipline for his actions or if she will be compensated for her damages? Are these the threats Mr. Brown was eluding to?
Of course, their response is contrary to their claims and we have another public records request pending specific to these alleged death threats. We have attached the policy and the counties response for our readers and we stand with evidence and public records to substantiate our reporting. Maybe the county could start doing the same.
Workplace Violence Policy Rev 02 03 by Picon Press Media LLC on Scribd