City College has agreed to pay former instructor Mark McIntire $120,000 as part a settlement approved by the Board of Trustees at its August 9 meeting.
The vote was 6-0 with Trustee Jonathan Abboud absent, according to Board President Veronica Gallardo. McIntire agreed to accept $120,000 as a condition to the settlement and he waived all potential claims of any nature against City College and its faculty and staff.
As part of the financial payout, $50,000 came from the college’s liability insurance, according to Luz Reyes-Martin, executive director of public affairs and communications. The remaining $70,000 came from the college’s general fund.
The settlement comes after the original May 14 termination notice, which was preceded by his third negative teaching evaluation from Philosophy Chair Marc Bobro and four female instructors filing Title IX harassment complaints against the long-time philosophy instructor. However, McIntire said part of the settlement states that any “ratifying negative determinations” from deans, vice presidents or human resources personnel will list him as resigned on August 3 rather than not-rehired or terminated.
“The most important part of my settlement agreement is the full purge till the end of time of all three negative teaching evaluations issued by Marc Bobro,” McIntire wrote to The Channels on Sept. 6.
He also added he was “fully exonerated” from all four Title IX complaints.
Judge Elinor Reiner, the retired judge hired by City College to investigate the complaints, determined that McIntire’s statements, although they were “gender-based in a purposefully disparaging fashion,” were still not severe enough to be considered in violation of Title IX law.
The college paid $25,900 from the legal services budget in the general fund for Reiner’s investigations, according to Reyes-Martin.
Raeanne Napoleon, a chemistry professor at City College, was the first to file a Title IX complaint against McIntire in April, following a controversy around a campus guest speaker McIntire invited to the campus. Napoleon said she is not pleased with the outcome of McIntire’s settlement with the college.
She said she is considering resigning from her teaching position because of the way the situation was handled, and disagrees with Judge Reiner’s finding.
“McIntire was allowed to harass me and anyone that stuck up for me for literally months,” Napoleon said. “And the four women that lodged a Title IX complaint against him begged the administration for help in every different way we knew how. We were worse than ignored. We were treated and continue to be treated like we’re the problem.
“If we would just shut up and go away and get over it, everything would be fine. I am not willing to be part of something that says they do such a great job at promoting equity and making an inclusive environment when I have been worse than ignored.”
McIntire, on the other hand, said he was content with the outcome of the settlement and called it “a sane and sober conclusion to [his] dispute” in a letter to his supporters on his gofundme page. He listed four “systemic outcomes” of the settlement as his reasons for accepting it as follows:
“1. the tax-payers who fund SBCC are spared the burden of expensive and lengthy legal proceedings.
2. the noble work of many dedicated faculty, staff, and students will not be interrupted by protracted media reports of legal actions.
3. the core prime-movers of academic freedom suppression at SBCC have now fingered themselves as mere instances of a national crisis in Constitutional freedom protections enshrined in our Bill of Rights.
4. the College can now move forward crafting Constitutional pathways to protect the expressions of opposing views to the prevailing ‘liberal-progressives’ both on the SBCC campus and the larger citizenry.”
Although McIntire is no longer with the college, Napoleon said she’s still troubled by the ordeal.
“It’s not over for me,” Napoleon said. “Everybody wants to pretend that it’s over now that he’s gone, but it’s not over for me. I’m still angry.”
