TAMPA — Two longtime Tampa Water Department employees retired last week rather than be fired over complaints from a co-worker who said she received unwanted text messages, had to deal with inappropriate comments and worried about losing her job if she complained.
Utility technician Timothy E. Johnson, 49, left a job that paid him about $52,770 annually after 17 years with the city.
Senior team leader Ronald Calderoni, 54, retired after working for the city for 32 years, leaving at a salary of $90,459 a year.
Neither Johnson nor Calderoni responded to telephone and text messages the Tampa Bay Times left for them over three working days.
Had they not retired, "each would have been dismissed," city human resources director Kimberly Crum told the Times. "Each of the employees asked to retire. We allowed them to retire prior to meting out their discipline."
Each man had received ratings of excellent and outstanding in past performance reviews, but city officials concluded that their actions amounted to sexual harassment that created a hostile work environment in the department's water production office.
Human resources officials said in a memo to Calderoni that other employees had said they would not allow their daughters to work there.
Johnson, officials said, sent co-worker Brandy Harrison suggestive text messages such as "Damn you are so Sexy," left her notes and told her he bought her a pair of panties, leaving the bag on her desk. She told city officials she asked him several times to stop, but he didn't.
The text messages continued even after city personnel officials warned Johnson in late May that he could face discipline on the job and the matter might even be referred to police if he didn't stop. They told him to stop contacting her outside of work hours.
He didn't, officials said, and later denied continuing to text her until he was shown texts he had sent.
In May, Harrison told her supervisor, Calderoni, that what Johnson was doing "was making her very uncomfortable at work," according to city records.
A little more than a month later, she met with human resources to talk not only about Johnson but Calderoni, too. She told city officials that she began to feel uncomfortable about two weeks after a private staffing agency sent her to work in the water production office in early April.
In introducing Harrison to others, according to officials, Calderoni said, "Isn't she pretty? Isn't she fine?" prompting one employee to respond, "You are trippin' " and to walk away. Calderoni also twice kissed her on the cheek, sent her non-work-related texts, including one about her body lotion, and asked her to "dance for us" at his birthday lunch, according to a notice of disciplinary action the city prepared.
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Explore all your optionsShe told several others that she was afraid to report the problems because it might cost her her job, "a comment you did say you made with regard to her work," city officials said in the notice to Calderoni.
Times senior news researcher John Martin contributed to this report. Contact Richard Danielson at rdanielson@tampabay.com. Follow @Danielson_Times