CSU appeals decision in whistle-blower case

Colorado State University has appealed the State Personnel Board’s ruling that found CSU violated the state whistle-blower law when it fired a worker in June 2001.

The appeal from the university will bring the case to the Colorado Court of Appeals, where a three-judge panel will hear it by June 2003 at the latest.

In August, the Personnel Board upheld an earlier decision by an administrative law judge, awarding back wages, court costs and attorney fees to former forest service mechanic and firefighter Michael Rura.

Officials for the CSU-run forest service filed a notice of appeal on Oct. 3.

“We simply believe the judge and the State Personnel Board were in error in their decisions,´ said Laurence Pendleton, associate general counsel for the university. “If we thought we had no chances on appeal, we wouldn’t be wasting our time.”

Rura, who worked at the Forest Service’s shop at the Foothills Campus in Fort Collins, alleges years of harassment following internal disclosures that supervisors had ordered him to cover up an environmental hazard — an event that dates back to 1993.

According to the initial findings of fact, a shop supervisor in 1993 ordered Rura and another employee to dig up a rusty, leaking, 500-gallon underground storage tank that held spent petroleum, crush the tank and bury it in a different location. They were then told to take a clean tank, put some oil into it and bury it in yet another location. A year later, when a government inspection agency checked the decoy tank, no leaks or contamination were found. At that point, Rura said he realized he had been ordered to cover up an environmental hazard.

The initial findings of fact state that, after Rura told supervisors about the incident, he was subjected to undue harassment, culminating in his termination, which was referred to as “a shocking violation and an act of retaliation against the employee.”

Rura’s lawyer, Cecilia Serna, said a recent decision by the State Supreme Court places limitations on the time frame Rura is eligible to collect back wages.

In Gallagher v. the University of Northern Colorado the court limited the timeframe for collecting back wages in a suit claiming violation to the Whistle-Blower Act to 180 days prior to the claimants’ filing of a tort notice.

Rura filed his claim on Dec. 11, 2001.

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