SPOKANE, Wash. — An attorney from a Bothell-based law firm has been chosen to lead the investigation into racial discrimination allegations within Spokane City Hall.
Kathleen Haggard will work to determine if Cupid Alexander, the former Director of Housing, was treated differently due to his race. Haggard is an attorney at the law firm Haggard and Ganson. Haggard's expertise lies in municipal law, workplace investigations and public works.
City spokesman Brian Coddington said the investigation is expected to last 30 days and Haggard will be paid $20,000.
Cupid Alexander, the man who for the last seven months has been in charge of Spokane's homelessness response, accused City Administrator Johnnie Perkins of treating him differently because he is Black.
Mayor Nadine Woodward ordered the third-party investigation after emails were released that detailed Alexander's experience in his role. The city’s legal and human resource teams contracted the firm to facilitate access to resources and individuals at the request of the outside investigator and serve as the point of contact.
The emails were sent to Perkins and many other city leaders were copied. Alexander expressed extreme frustration with his treatment and experience working for the city.
"You have a routine history of misconstruing and inaccurately representing words and actions," Alexander wrote. "You have treated me in comparison to my peers in a very disparate way."
Alexander complained that Perkins was attempting to force him out of his role sooner than his announced July 30 end date by omitting him from meetings and asking him to hand over duties.
"I have nothing to do, as you have 'taken it all from here,'" he wrote. "You have not done this to ANY other leader in housing except me. I've watched as they have come and go, and yet none of them were treated like this, even as they took MONTHS of leave off with zero notice, leaving me and others to scrape together the work... even as I was a new employee who received ZERO onboarding."
"I'm trying to move on in peace, quite frankly for this EXACT treatment. And yet it continues. I'm unsure of why I'm being treated like this... I assume it's race," Alexander wrote. "As the lone black employee I'm tired of this treatment."
Alexander also described in the email an incident during which he says Perkins said that his son thought Alexander looked athletic, after which he asked whether Alexander played sports. Alexander said the remarks "had nothing to do with our conversation... and was stereotyping me in every possible way imaginable."
"I can say without a shadow of a doubt that this has been intentionally unethical, unequitable... direct mistreatment that I can attribute from YOUR treatment of me Johnnie, to my race," he wrote.
