Posted on 04/08/2003 3:13:43 PM PDT by Willie Green
For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use.
CARSON CITY -- Assembly Education Committee Chairman Wendell Williams, whose wife agreed to a $49,000 settlement from the state university system over racially offensive remarks about her, said Monday he would have rejected the deal and gone to court.
The settlement comes as state lawmakers debate record tax increases to fund state programs, including Nevada's cash-strapped public universities and colleges.
"If it had been my case, I would have taken it all the way to court," Williams said of his wife's $1.5 million lawsuit. "There was no denial the statement was made. Any case they had would have been indefensible in court."
Williams, D-Las Vegas, said he did not learn of the settlement until he returned home from the Legislature on Friday evening. He said his wife, Zelda, had agreed that day to take the settlement in exchange for dropping her lawsuit against the Community College of Southern Nevada.
Zelda Williams, who is black, filed the lawsuit after the use of a racial epithet in August 2001 by Mike Meyer, a top-ranking community college official. For a time, Meyer was the college's interim president.
She was within earshot of Meyer when he made the offensive remark to a colleague who was about to meet with Zelda Williams to advise her on college matters.
While waiting for her meeting, prospective student Zelda Williams overheard Meyer remark in reference to her, "She's a nigger, and niggers are never on time." Days later, Meyer publicly apologized, called the remark a stupid mistake and resigned under pressure from community college President Ron Remington and others.
A legislator since 1987, Wendell Williams said he had nothing to do with the litigation and the decision to take the settlement was entirely made by his wife.
His wife makes decisions independently from him, he said, and he joked that he only hopes "she buys me lunch."
Acknowledging Williams' high-profile position, Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, and Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick, R-Gardnerville, found nothing objectionable to a settlement with Williams' spouse.
"I don't have a problem with it," Hettrick said. "If someone thinks it is wrong, then they should complain to the Ethics Commission."
"If we are going to have a citizens' Legislature, we will have situations arise like this," Perkins said. "It is up to the public, the voters to decide if it was wrong or not."
Perkins said the settlement was newsworthy largely because of Williams' position in the Legislature but was otherwise a personal matter.
University and Community College System of Nevada Chancellor Jane Nichols and Remington agreed to the settlement, although the system's top lawyer, Tom Ray, said an offer of no more than $5,000 should be made to Zelda Williams.
Remington said the college would use student revenues from such sources as bookstore and vending sales to cover the vast majority of the settlement.
Wendell Williams credited his wife's lawyer, Richard Segerblom, with persuading Nichols and Remington to make the settlement.
"I don't think (my influence) had anything to do with it," he said. "The attorney has more influence, more clout than I do. I never intervened or talked with anyone."
In December, the state Supreme Court ruled unanimously that Segerblom was justified to release to the media the details of a confidential agreement he made with the Clark County School District.
Justices ruled Segerblom was permitted to give details of the confidential agreement to the Review-Journal in 1999 to defend himself against a complaint filed by the school district and Edward Goldman, then assistant superintendent of staff relations.
Goldman and the school district contended Segerblom engaged in harassment by filing frivolous lawsuits for disciplined teachers. The district thought enough of one case to pay Segerblom $30,000.
This case makes me very angry.
Me too.
I can certainly see where Meyer's offensive remarks were entirely inappropriate for someone with his administrative position with the university, and required immediate termination of his employment.
But I don't see where the specifics of this particular situation merit any financial compensation to Williams (at least not from the university, if she want to sue Meyer personally, that's fine with me.) IMHO, Zelda Williams and her husband are just trying to milk this incident for all the money they can stuff into their pockets. And in the long run, that'll just detract from the quality of education that the university can offer and/or drive up the cost of education.
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