Former Vallejo employee reaches $1M settlement in wrongful termination case
VALLEJO – The city of Vallejo has agreed to settle a wrongful termination whistleblower lawsuit with a former employee for $1 million, according to the woman's attorney.
Joanna Altman, former assistant to former city manager Greg Nyhoff, sued the city in 2021, along with former employees Slater Matzke and Will Morat, who also worked under Nyhoff.
The suit alleges that the trio were fired in 2020 after trying to bring to light Nyhoff's various alleged dealings around a Mare Island land and development deal, among other things.
In their suit, the three accuse Nyhoff of "graft and corruption" and of "negotiating against the city's interest" in the land deal involving the development of the decommissioned Mare Island Naval Shipyard. The trio also allege that they were retaliated against them when they tried to bring their concerns to light.
The suit also names current Chief Assistant City Attorney Randy Risner and former director of human resources Heather Ruiz.
"This $1 million settlement is bittersweet," Altman said in a news release Tuesday. "Personally, I feel vindicated as a whistleblower who did my duty to report wrongdoing. However, many of the actors that enabled this conduct to work against the interests of the community are still in City Hall."
While the city settled with Altman, they have yet to do so with Morat, former assistant to the city manager for economic development, and Matzke, special advisor to the city manager, according to the news release.
However, Morat and Matzke have said that it has always been their goal to take the case to trial so that the city's "corruption" can be exposed, as well as making public the depositions from Nyhoff and all of the principal players in the suit that would not be released if a settlement occurred.
The trial is scheduled to begin in October.
In addition to alleged backroom dealings, Nyhoff is also accused of creating a "culture of discrimination, harassment and retaliation in Vallejo that was so deeply embedded that other employees felt free to do the same."
Additionally, the lawsuit claims that the city's human resources department rarely, if ever, investigated complaints of wrongdoing.
The plaintiffs say the City Council ordered what turned out to be "a sham investigation" of Nyhoff that resulted in the three being fired.
"Rather than do the right thing and look into serious allegations of wrongdoing, the City chose to sweep the matter under the rug and fire loyal employees who tried to alert the City Council of what was going on," said Randall Strauss, Altman's attorney. "The City has now paid an extremely steep price for attacking the messenger instead of solving the problem."
Expensive settlements are piling up in Vallejo. The city recently agreed to a $5 million settlement in January with the family of Willie McCoy, who was shot over 50 times by Vallejo police in 2019 as he woke up in his car in a Taco Bell drive-thru.
Neither a city spokesperson, Risner nor Ruiz immediately responded to requests for comment.