Settlement reached in suit accusing ex-Suffolk County Community College president of sexual harassment, court papers show
The Sagtikos Arts and Science Center at Suffolk County Community College in Brentwood in 2015.
The Suffolk County Community College board of trustees has approved a settlement agreement with a former admissions counselor who alleged she was sexually harassed, intimidated and ridiculed by the institution’s former president.
An agreement was reached during a 2½-hour conference before U.S. District Court Judge Joan Azrack Feb. 21, according to a record of the meeting filed in Eastern District Court of New York. The terms of the settlement, which was approved by resolution without discussion at the board's meeting Thursday, were not publicly disclosed.
Kathleen Andresen, of Manorville, filed a lawsuit in February 2020, alleging that she left her job 11 months earlier because she was “subject to continual sexual harassment actions, deliberate misuse of power and authority, discriminatory insults, ridicule and intimidation” by former college President Shaun McKay.
Andresen had sought $70,000 per year in lost wages from March 2018 to the present, $1 million in compensatory damages for physical and psychological abuse and punitive damages to be determined by the court.
Andresen’s attorney, Thomas Stanziale of Garden City, declined to comment, saying the terms of the settlement are “supposed to be confidential.”
Drew Biondo, a spokesman for the college, said following trustee approval the parties are now "drafting a settlement agreement for signature." A settlement status update was due to Azrack Friday.
A joint pretrial order filed to the court Feb. 15 by Stanziale and the county attorney’s office noted that McKay, who had initially been named as a co-defendant in the lawsuit, “could not be located and had not appeared in this action.”
McKay, who was hired for the 26,000-student college’s top post in 2010 and had his contract extended two years later, was placed on paid leave of absence from the $308,710-a-year job in January 2019. Four months later, the school reached a $555,000 settlement that was unanimously approved by seven trustees and terminated McKay’s contract 15 months early.
In a June 2019 email to the college community making public McKay’s departure, trustee Theresa Sanders, then the board chair, stated: “There were no findings of wrongdoing, incapacity or misconduct on the part of Dr. McKay during his tenure as president.”
Andresen’s complaint alleged the college tolerated a “hostile work environment” and violated the Title VII clause of the Civil Rights Act barring employment discrimination on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin and religion.
In the pretrial order filed with the courts, Stanziale wrote that his client was expected to testify about an alleged incident in April 2018 following on open house when she was invited to McKay’s office on the Brentwood campus, where he “exposed himself” and asked her “to perform sexual acts.”
Assistant County Attorney Hope Senzer Gabor wrote in the pretrial order that the attorneys for the college were prepared to argue the institution “maintains adequate discrimination and sexual harassment training, prevention and reporting policies” and that much of the communication between McKay and Andresen occurred while he was on administrative leave from the college and not acting in his role as president. Gabor outlined 19 ways the case was defensible and said Andresen’s supervisor would have testified that she never reported the alleged harassment.
Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.
