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Davenport city worker goes for promotion, gets fired instead
Home / News / Local News Davenport city worker goes for promotion, gets fired instead StoryDiscussionDavenport city worker goes for promotion, gets fired instead Tory Brecht The Quad-City Times | Posted: Sunday, August 1, 2010 2:00 am | (26) Comments
Font Size:Default font sizeLarger font sizeIf Rory Armstrong were content to stay a pothole patcher and occasional snowplow driver for the city of Davenport, he’d still have his job and his house today.
But Armstrong decided to apply for a promotion. And, as a result, the 43-year-old was fired in 2008 after failing a vision test. Armstrong, who had received favorable job performance reviews and maintained a valid commercial driver’s license, or CDL, was forced out because the city’s human resources department adopted new standards from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
In the two years since, his credit score has plummeted and he lost his house to foreclosure.
“I got canned and it all went down,” he said.
Things could be looking up soon for Armstrong, however.
On Wednesday, the Iowa Court of Appeals upheld Scott County District Judge Marleta Greve’s order that the city hire Armstrong back. Tom Warner, the city’s corporate counsel, said the city will ask for a review by the Iowa Supreme Court, believing there were “determinative errors” in Greve’s ruling.
The appeals court noted that municipal governments were specifically exempted from having to use the new federal requirements, and that the Davenport City Council needed to approve the change in city policy establishing the new guidelines.Furthermore, the ruling says, the city could not prove that Armstrong could not “adequately or safely perform” the jobs he was asked to do. The judges noted that although the vision in his left eye was 20/200, he possessed 20/15 uncorrected vision using both eyes, he received a favorable job review the year prior to being terminated and he possessed a valid Iowa CDL.
“We are persuaded by the foregoing evidence that the commission did not show Armstrong was physically incapable of performing his job duties,” the appeals court wrote. “We accordingly find the city’s reasons for discharging Armstrong ... to be arbitrary.”
The ironic thing, Armstrong said, is that he wouldn’t even have a CDL if it weren’t for the city.
He was hired by the city as a custodian but lost that job due to budget cuts in 2006. Before he was laid off, the city’s human resources and public works departments personnel helped workers losing their jobs train for the CDL test, he said.
The city even paid for the test.
After getting his license, Armstrong was hired back and put on the pothole patching and snowplowing crew. It wasn’t until he applied for the higher-paying street maintenance worker job in May 2008 that the problem with his amblyopia, or lazy eye, was determined to be grounds for termination.
“The way they make it out, I should be walking with a cane, but I can still see fine using both my eyes,” he said. “I have my CDL, and the state keeps renewing it.”
Working for the city was the best job he’d ever had, Armstrong said.
“It was a decent job and it’s got decent benefits and that’s what I’m in need of,” he said. “I’m just struggling along and waiting for them to accept that they have to take me back. I know it’s going to be awkward going back, but I liked working there.”
Warner said the city will argue that the human resources department had the authority to impose the stricter guidelines even though they weren’t mandated. The city is trying to maintain a high degree of safety, he added.
“The federal government didn’t pull those standards out of the air,” he said.
“There were studies done and the agency determined those were the minimum requirements for safety.”
