The Metropolitan Transit System released a report Thursday it commissioned to review what its leaders knew about a relationship between one of its employees and its board chair when they decided to fire that employee.
In a press release, MTS said the report concluded that former County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher, who was chair of MTS, did not have anything to do with the firing of Grecia Figueroa, who alleged, after she lost her job, that Fletcher had sexually assaulted and harassed her. The allegations forced Fletcher to leave his post at MTS and eventually resign from the county Board of Supervisors. But he has always maintained he had “consensual encounters” with Figueroa.
We’ve had two main questions since this scandal broke: What happened between Figueroa and Fletcher, did he assault her as she claims he did? And why did MTS fire her?
His legal team last week released a bevy of messages that helped substantiate the claim that Figueroa had just as much interest sexually in him as he did in her. They exchanged hundreds of messages on Instagram and together planned ways they could be alone. The new messages show she expressed interest even after the encounters she said were abusive.
Figueroa’s lawyers, in response, have said that Fletcher does not understand the nature of consent, including how it can be withdrawn at any time. Still, the messages provided a glimpse into their relationship while she was an employee of the agency he led as chair.
The second question: Why did MTS fire her shortly after their online flirtations ended?
We now have the full record. The report exhaustively chronicles Figueroa’s performance reviews, her allegations and MTS managers’ decision to terminate her employment and then what happened as her allegations about Fletcher began to surface.
But investigators did not interview her. Fletcher provided written responses to their questions.
The report will help MTS leaders as they argue they did not know about Fletcher’s interactions with Figueroa but it also reveals they considered her performance at the agency to be exceeding expectations right up until the time her online exchanges with Fletcher turned into in-person encounters.
Aside from the question of whether Fletcher sexually assaulted Figueroa, the public’s most important interest in the case is why MTS fired Figueroa shortly after her exchanges with Fletcher stopped and the very day he announced his campaign for state Senate. Here are our major takeaways from the report:
Figueroa’s Performance ‘Exceeded Expectations’ Before 2022
Figueroa claimed MTS had to know about their relationship and Fletcher must have been involved in her firing.
The report though has all her performance reviews including the the last one, which warned she may lose her job without “immediate” improvement in her performance. But that was after a year in which her managers had said her performance “exceeds job requirements.” Here’s how things went.
Figueroa’s first performance review came after six months on the job. Managers use a 4-point scale:
0 – unacceptable
1 – needs improvement
2 – meets job requirements
3 – exceeds job requirements
4 – distinguished performance
They determined after six months she had merited a 2.85, above expectations but not all the way to “exceeds job requirements.” By the end of her first year, in 2020, however, she was exceeding job requirements and got a 3.0. A year later, in August 2021, she earned a 3.1, even better than exceeding job requirements.
The next year, though, after her encounters with Fletcher had begun, they rated her performance at just 2.0 “meets job requirements.” And more importantly, they warned that they needed to see “immediate and sustained improvement” in a number of areas, or her job could be in jeopardy.
The report, however, reveals that managers considered putting her on an explicit performance-improvement plan, often the last step before termination, and they decided against it.
“The fact that Figueroa received a negative evaluation only after the alleged sexual harassment and assault by Fletcher, could suggest that her job performance was not the reason for the termination,” investigators wrote. But they also found that managers had become more and more frustrated with her work and didn’t know about what was happening with Fletcher.
Managers also discovered something else: They were underpaying Figueroa at a $60,000 salary.
“They also realized Figueroa was underpaid and decided to give her an immediate 3% salary increase and make a conditional offer of an additional 3% if she showed sustained improvement,” according to the report. They finalized that and what would be her last employee performance evaluation in September 2022.
‘Areas for Improvement’
On June 9, 2022, Fletcher messaged Figueroa while he presided over an MTS Executive Committee meeting and while she was in the audience. They met in an adjacent room where she claims he assaulted her but his legal team released messages that indicate she enjoyed the meeting.
That summer is also when her managers started to agitate about her performance. She was missing deadlines, communicating with colleagues poorly and not organizing events or projects well. It took her managers two months to finalize her review that concluded she “meets job requirements” but it came with a warning.
“We believe that you have the potential to be a high performer, as your ‘Areas of Strength’ described above are excellent. We want you to succeed in this position. However, immediate and sustained improvement in the ‘Areas of Improvement’ section is necessary to maintain employment,” they wrote to her.
By January, her manager Mark Olson wanted her out. The human resources chief, Jeff Stumbo, suggested they put her on a performance improvement plan. But Olson said he feared she would improve for a bit but “the same issues would return.”
Olson had never fired anyone before.
‘Interested in Terminating Her’
Figueroa’s lawsuit says she was fired from MTS on Feb. 6, 2023.
The agency’s chief human resources officer told investigators that’s not quite right. Stumbo said he met with her on that date to tell her that MTS was “interested in terminating her but wished to negotiate a separation agreement.” He told investigators she seemed surprised and expressed she didn’t see it coming.
“On February 7, 2023, Stumbo emailed Figueroa with more specifics regarding the reasons for her termination,” according to the report. And yet he still had not terminated her employment. Finally, he sent her a formal termination letter on Feb. 17, 2023.
MTS Learned Feb. 7 That Something Had Happened with Fletcher
Before they officially fired Figueroa, agency leaders learned she believed they were firing her because of Fletcher.
On Feb. 7, 2023, Figueroa texted a former co-worker.
GF: “I was ‘fired/laid off’ yesterday. This is next level bad. This is beyond I could ever imagine. This involves a board member”
Response: “Oh shit. Im sorry, Grecia. (sad emoji)”
Figueroa wanted to talk to the co-worker but the co-worker, whose name is redacted in the report, was reluctant to get involved.
Response: “Do you think your being laid off has something to do with this board member?”
GF: “Yeah”
Then she went on to ask if they could call her.
GF: “Not involving you in anything. And for reference. Look up who made a ‘big announcement yesterday.’”
That employee shared those messages with Olson. Olson got screenshots of the messages, and according to the report, “he ‘put two and two together’ and figured out that Figueroa was likely referring to Fletcher when stating, ‘This involves a board member,’ and ‘Look up who made a ‘big announcement’ yesterday,’ since Fletcher had recently announced his run for the California Senate.”
Olson shared those messages with MTS’s General Counsel Karen Landers and CEO Sharon Cooney on Feb. 7, 2023. According to the report, Cooney speculated that the messages could mean anything from Fletcher looking at Figueroa funny to a relationship. But it was just speculation.
“… it is fair to assume that by February 7, it was known that Figueroa was telling people there was a connection between her termination and Fletcher,” according to the report.
They Still Fired Her and Apologized to … Fletcher
The texts did not cause MTS leaders to pause and investigate further. They went forward with the termination.
After Figueroa’s attorney sent a letter directed to MTS and Fletcher on Feb. 17, 2023, to inform them that he would be representing her, Cooney contacted Fletcher. She texted him at 11:08 p.m., “Fyi we have a terminated employee Grecia contacting you. Our counsel is aware. Sorry to involve you.”
Though MTS leaders knew that Figueroa was connecting Fletcher to her firing, the report gives no indication that MTS set out to investigate if there was something they should know about their relationship after Feb. 7, 2023.
Are you saying that she stopped doing her job because she was kissing the boss? Thanks for this important article about a man who is unknown to 10/10 people on the street in San Diego.
She sounds like a conyving deceitful person as does he!
Don’t misunderstand: Fletcher blew up his career (and potentially his marriage) by having an affair with a co-worker. Fletcher has a history of flirting (and probably cheating), and I believe that Figueroa was initially excited to attract the attention of someone with power and charisma–and that the relationship started consensually. Was there a point in time when Figueroa no longer wanted a relationship but Fletcher didn’t want to stop? Could be. Did Figueroa’s job performance slide because she was in a non-consensual relationship that distressed her or a consensual relationship that distracted her? That will be for a jury to decide, but the information to date doesn’t support her claim that she was fired because of him.