Medford mayor places city's veteran's services director on leave pending a psych eval

Medford Police Friday walked the city’s director of veteran’s services from City Hall after he filed a hostile work environment complaint against the mayor and her Chief People Officer Neil Osborne and accused the latter of alleged wage theft.

Michael Durham was led out of the building by officers shortly before it closed for the weekend around 12:30 p.m.

In a document from the mayor, Durham was notified he had been placed on paid administrative leave pending a psychological fitness for duty exam. He was also informed by the mayor’s new interim chief of staff Nina Nazarian that the interview had not yet been scheduled.

Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn said through her spokeswoman Jackie Piques, that as a matter of policy, she does not comment on personnel matters.

City Council President Rick Caraviello and Councilor Michael Marks said Durham had been escorted out by police.

“This is of some concern,” Marks said, explaining the employee invoked the state’s whistle-blower shield law that protects employees who report misconduct by their employers from reprisals. “That he was stepping up, and then escorted out of City Hall, is of some concern."

In the document supplied by Mark Rumley, Durham's attorney, Lungo-Koehn cited Durham’s “actions and conduct” in her office Thursday as the reason for placing him on leave. There were no details of the type of actions or conduct included in the document.

Durham explained that on Thursday he had asked Osborne about a hearing the human resources officer is scheduled to attend Sept. 24. Durham wanted to know what Osborne was going to say when he testified before a state commission investigating Massachusetts Civil Service laws as they pertain to municipal hiring.

Following Osborne’s directive to speak with the mayor about any remarks, Durham said he approached Lungo-Koehn and was rebuffed because he is “represented by counsel.”

Lungo-Koehn was alluding to former city solicitor Rumley who is representing Durham in his quest to be paid for work he performed as a hearing officer for the city, duties outside his directorship of the city’s Veteran’s Services office.

Durham claimed he requested clarification from City Solicitor Kimberly Scanlon, who told him Thursday afternoon the mayor did not have grounds to deny him a meeting. She suggested he document the exchange.

Durham said he cannot perform his job if he is denied information about issues and events that concern veterans in the city.

In a letter to Lungo-Koehn and the City Council, Rumley requested copies of any surveillance video taken in or around the mayor’s office on Thursday, Sept. 16 and any statements taken by Scanlon pertaining to the conversations between Durham and the mayor and Osborne.

Rumley is also requesting the name and qualifications of the “psychological expert” hired to examine Durham.

The mayor, he claimed, is retaliating against Durham for bring to light the alleged wage theft on the part of her staffer and for questioning the mayor’s decision to request a state waiver for hiring police officers for the city.

Durham, who was requested to take on the duties of hearing officer in May 2020, adjudicating disputed parking tickets and municipal summonses, claims he has yet to be paid for all the hours he worked.

He also said the two $5,000 stipends set aside to pay the city’s hearing officer were exhausted before he applied for compensation, even though the city held no hearings during the first seven months of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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“Neil didn’t conduct any hearing in 2020, I cleared the backlog to January, but he kept the money,” Durham said.

The veteran’s services director also accused the city of illegally paying Osborne an extra $30,000 a year since January 2020. That was when the administration consolidated two departments, human resources with diversity and inclusion, appointing Osborne to head it and raising his salary as his responsibilities increased.

The department has since been separated; the responsibilities diminished; yet the salary for Osborne’s job as human resources director has not shrunk correspondingly. And the City Council has voted twice not to fully fund the position.

More:Medford mayor denies City Council funds for investigation/counsel

In the spring, the mayor requested the state allow Medford to hire officers who were fluent in one of three languages: Spanish, Portuguese, and Haitian Creole, bypassing the standard lists that give veterans preferentially status for city jobs.

The state demurred, requesting more information before entertaining any changes to the hiring lists.

“This is a thinly-veiled attempt to retaliate against (Mr. Durham),” Rumley wrote in his letter to the city. “This action is discriminatory and an additional indication of a hostile work environment that has been fostered against him.”