McCoy succeeds in filing EEOC charge; case against county continues

ALBANY — Former Dougherty County Administrator and current interim Terrell County Administrator Michael McCoy’s complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has been assigned a charge number and officially filed with the federal organization.

What that means, according to McCoy’s attorney, Maurice King of Albany, is that McCoy’s $5 million lawsuit against Dougherty County can now move forward.

“The reason you file a complaint with EEOC is that a government entity does not get immunity with an EEOC complaint,” King said Wednesday. “There is no ‘diplomatic immunity,’ if you will.

“The way it’s supposed to work is, now that a charge number has officially been filed, the county will be asked to respond to the charge. We’ll get their response and respond to it, if required to.”

McCoy, who was fired by the Dougherty County Commission after more than a quarter-century of work with the county, because the board said, at various times, that McCoy “disrespected” the chairman (Lorenzo Heard) and board members by not discussing plans to hire Barry Brooks as the county’s assistant administrator and, at a public meeting, that the county had been steadily losing population over the last several years.

McCoy had fallen out of favor with Heard, who referred to him on a local radio broadcast as “the white man’s Negro” and as an “Uncle Tom,” and with Commissioner Gloria Gaines when he brought charges against former County Commissioner John Hayes when Hayes threatened to “take his job” after the two were involved in an altercation during a meeting in Savannah.

McCoy also angered Commissioner Victor Edwards when Edwards sought to reprimand county employees Wendy Howell and Scott Addison, both of whom have since resigned. And McCoy refused to approve an expense report filed by Commissioner Clinton Johnson on which Johnson had illegally charged alcoholic beverages on the county card and had a hotel charge of more than $700 for a single night.

Heard, Gaines, Johnson and Edwards, who voted to remove McCoy, are all black, as is McCoy. Brooks, who currently serves as interim administrator, Howell and Addison are white, a factor that comes into play in McCoy’s EEOC complaint.

In it, he writes, “I was terminated shortly after I hired a white male to be assistant county administrator. … Prior to the action Heard had referred to me as ‘a white folk’s ni — -’ and an ‘Uncle Tom.’ … I believe I have been discriminated against and retaliated against … because I have been treated differently from white males.

“A white male’s (Brooks’) employment contract was honored and my employment contract was not. This white male was treated more favorably than me, as were other white males. … I believe that I have been discriminated against because of my race and retaliated against in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.”

McCoy marked “RACE,” “RETALIATION,” and CONTINUING ACTION” blocks as the basis for discrimination on the EEOC Charge of Discrimination form.

“The case is moving along,” King said Wednesday. “This kind of thing takes time, and it’s moving actually faster than some.”

Asked if county officials had “dug in” with the intent of taking the case to trial, King said there might be another reason for the county’s stance.

“I don’t know if it’s so much that they’re dug in than maybe it’s that the folks who are representing them want to make that money,” he said.

Special Photo