Firing of Ehrlich administration employee (the ice dancer) upheld by court
The legal saga surrounding former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich’s personnel practices continued this week when Maryland’s second highest court found that Gov. Martin O’Malley’s administration was within its rights to fire a holdover patronage employee from Ehrlich’s term.
The case centers on the employment of Gregory Maddalone, who was fired in 2007 shortly after O’Malley came into office. Maddalone, a former ice dancer, was a central figure in an investigation by Democratic lawmakers who accused the Republican Ehrlich administration of firing long-time state employees for political reasons and hiring “loyalists” to replace them. When Maddalone was fired, Republicans accused the Democrats of hypocrisy.
An administrative judge ruled that then-Transportation Secretary John D. Porcari illegally fired Maddalone, finding that Porcari didn’t know Maddalone’s qualifications and targeted him for political reasons. At the time, Maddalone was an emergency response manager earning an annual salary of more than $79,000. The Anne Arundel County Circuit Court later upheld that ruling.
But the Court of Special Appeals held this week that even if Porcari had dug further into Maddalone’s resume, he wouldn’t have found much reason to retain him. Porcari said he decided to fire Maddalone as part of a planned reorganization.
“There was nothing in the evidence to show that any additional effort or time that Secretary Porcari (or anyone else) could have taken to obtain Maddalone’s personnel file would have uncovered positive information about his job qualifications,” the ruling states. “Indeed, the evidence was clear that there was no such positive information to be learned.”
Earlier in the opinion, the court made a point of saying Maddalone did not hold a college degree and that his prior work experience — except for working as an aide to Ehrlich in Congress — was as an ice dancer.
The decision can be found here.
UPDATE:
Separately, the Maryland Court of Appeals ruled last year that Maddalone and another former state employee Craig Chesek must answer questions posed by a special legislative panel that investigated firings under Ehrlich. Maddalone’s testimony was taken in July, and an assistant attorney general is seeking to subpoena Chesek, who apparently lives in Pennsylvania.
Comments
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Posted by: andy wallace | September 1, 2009 1:45 PM
Here's a question that never arose in litigation:
Why was Mr. Maddalone's personnel file found scrubbed clean when the new administration arrived, and how was Mr. Maddalone able to so handily produced copies of his missing performance reviews for the administrative law judge?
Does anyone think a 20-something young man without a college degree who shows up for his Ehrlich granted $79,000/year state job in a "You're Fired" t-shirt would get anything less than sparkling performance reviews?
Could Mr. Ehrlich and his crew scream their arrogance and disdain for the state work force and the taxpayers any louder?
- Steve Lebowitz
Posted by: justdafacts | September 1, 2009 3:45 PM
Could Mr. Ehrlich and his crew scream their arrogance and disdain for the state work force and the taxpayers any louder?
Not as loud as the O'Malley has!
Posted by: Fed Up | September 1, 2009 4:06 PM
Nevertheless, it remains true, despite the opinion of a court stacked with Democrat sycophants (let's remember in what state this incident takes place, people), that it is pure and simple hypocrisy on the part of the Democrats to scream "ABUSE!!" when Gov. Ehrlich purges Democrat political appointees, yet turns right around and does the same thing with a Republican appointee. And those are the real facts.
Posted by: I'llGiveYouFacts | September 1, 2009 4:17 PM
As a state employee of more than 35 years, I find much to disagree with in the O'Malley administration. Nevertheless, he seems to have made a good faith effort to find people with some expertise in their fields to put in positions of authority. Erhlich, on the other hand, seems to have gone out of his way to find people who were wholly unqualified to put in positions of authority, so long as they were loyal to him. I think this practice is contemptible.
Posted by: Moe | September 1, 2009 5:44 PM
This is what is wrong with our state.
Everywhere I turn another lawyer is deciding where my tax money will go.
I want it to help the poor who have lost their way.
I want it to help the elderly keep warm in the winter.
I want it to go towards protecting all of us from evil crime.
Talking about who is qualified and who is not to keep his/hers job is nuts.
Paying lawyers to continue this madness is double nuts.
Posted by: Carole | September 2, 2009 8:46 AM
all good things
Posted by: Globals | October 3, 2009 8:57 AM