THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, October 8, 1996 TAG: 9610090620
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
DATELINE: FRANKLIN LENGTH: 27 lines
Mayor James P. Councill III said Monday that a $15 million lawsuit filed by a former acting city manager against four current or former city officials has been settled.
The settlement required that the terms not be disclosed.
The lawsuit had been filed by Dale R. Cooke, who claimed that discrimination was behind her firing in October 1995. Named in the suit were Councilmen W. Norwood Boyd and Oscar W. Babb, former Councilman Lynn E. Powell and former Mayor C. Franklin Jester.
The defendants and three others who had been dropped earlier from the suit are white. Cooke was the first African-American to hold the top post in Franklin. She had been hired as assistant to former City Manager John J. ``Jack'' Jackson in April 1994.
When Jackson was diagnosed with brain cancer, Cooke was named acting manager in January 1995. City officials cited ``personnel reasons'' for her dismissal last October. Earlier, Councill, who was not elected mayor until May 1995, Carlton L. Cutchin III and Dr. Robert T. Edwards were dropped from the case.
The suit alleged that the three, members of Citizens for Constructive Government, conspired with white council members to have Cooke terminated. by CNB