By Allison Wingate
Fostoria Review Times
FOSTORIA, Ohio — Fostoria Police Chief John McGuire has alleged city officials are retaliating against him for filing a worker’s compensation claim by failing to resolve issues concerning his pay.
McGuire has been on paid medical leave since July 2012, the result of an on-duty injury sustained in a motor vehicle accident. Fostoria Police Capt. Patrick Brooks has been handling the department’s administrative duties during his absence.
While McGuire was originally scheduled to return to duty Oct. 1, his leave was extended by his physician due to complications following surgery and subsequent physical therapy and rehabilitation.
Email exchanges between McGuire and city officials, obtained through a public records request Wednesday, indicate a deteriorating relationship.
McGuire sought a pay-out of 243.94 hours unused vacation time, with 80 hours carried over into 2013, in November. Safety Service Director Allyson Murray notified McGuire on Jan. 4 he was eligible for 12 weeks of leave beginning Jan. 3 under the Family and Medical Leave Act.
Prior to being granted his vacation time payout Dec. 17, Mayor Eric Keckler advised McGuire the city would not pay out the vacation time until an attorney confirmed it would not “complicate” his Bureau of Workers’ Compensation claim, according to an email dated Dec. 13.
In response, McGuire accused Keckler of conspiring to “disregard long standing city policy, well documented past practice and mis-state altogether the procedure and time lines for cashing in vacation,” an email dated Dec. 14 states.
“To continue to do so as you have smacks of retaliation and is quite possibly illegal and questionable at best,” McGuire writes.
Keckler disputed retaliating against McGuire in a response that same day.
“I have not once maligned or in any way spoken ill of your BWC claim. Quite to the contrary sir, I have had compassion for your injuries and concern over your physical well being"¦" he stated in the email.
In a Feb. 20 email, McGuire condemns Murray, suggesting she failed to send him his pay stubs electronically or notify him of the city’s new health insurance provider.
“I find it deplorable and inexcusable that you repeatedly tell people you are going to do something which is a simple task and part of your job responsibility as Safety Director and then never follow through,” McGuire writes.
Murray described his response as “insubordinate” and a “tirade” in her Feb. 21 response.
“While you may not agree with my directives and you may not like my decisions you are required to follow them as an employee under my direct supervision"¦ Further insubordinate outbursts on your part will not be tolerated,” she responds.
McGuire has also suggested Fostoria Payroll Administrator Carla Hillabrand failed to process a reimbursement of his pay, after making improper deductions, due to his involvement in an internal investigation that involved her in May 2010.
“I have voiced my issues, displeasure and many other financially related concerns with that office and specifically Carla’s questionable actions"¦ all subsequent to my own involvement of Carla’s previous on duty conduct, internal investigation, and other related issues that I had been ordered to handle by previous bosses,” McGuire states in an email to Keckler.
McGuire has not filed any formal complaints with the city from 2012-2013, Murray said.
McGuire was hired as the Fostoria Police Chief in 2006, and his current salary is $71,947.20. His contract is currently expired and the city has not offered him a new one.
A request seeking response from McGuire was not immediately returned.
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