Young Kwak photo
Amelia Clark, who already left her position as Spokane Regional Health District administrative officer, has agreed to never again serve in that role in order to close out a Washington State Board of Health investigation.
Amelia Clark will never again be the administrative officer of the Spokane Regional Health District after she reached an agreement with the Washington State Board of Health to close out her case that was scheduled to be heard by the Office of Administrative Hearings.
Clark, who has left her position leading the health district to take a job in another state, was scheduled to go before an administrative law judge in September (initially the matter was set to be heard in January of this year). The judge would have determined whether Clark illegally fired former health officer Dr. Bob Lutz in October 2020.
Clark met with Lutz on Oct. 29, 2020 and, according to Lutz, fired him immediately without providing him with a performance improvement plan or issuing other disciplinary action. The local health board's attorney emailed board members that evening to say that Clark had fired Lutz.
However, under Washington state law, an administrative officer may not single-handedly fire the health officer. Instead, a hearing needs to be held before the local health board, which needs to vote on the health officer's termination. Spokane's health board did meet a week after Clark and Lutz's conversation and, after hearing Clark's reasoning and Lutz's defense, voted 8-4 to fire Lutz.
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Dr. Bob Lutz (top) was fired as health officer for Spokane Regional Health District Thursday, Nov. 5, 2020, after district administrator Amelia Clark (bottom) asked the health board to fire him due to issues between them as leaders of the organization. The state Board of Health could determine whether actions Clark took before that meeting broke state law.
But before that meeting happened, concerned citizens had already filed complaints with the state health board calling on them to discipline Clark for not following state law. Those complaints triggered the board to commission an investigation and hand the matter over to the Office of Administrative Hearings, as Lutz is a member of the state health board and the members wanted a third-party to hear the case.
A stipulated agreement (see below) filed this month closed out the case without deciding the legal issues in question, instead noting "respondent will not accept an appointment as the administrative officer" at Spokane Regional Health District in the future.
Clark's time leading the health district saw mass resignations of experienced leaders in the organization, with the pressures of the pandemic and conflicts with management driving many to leave. While a "culture of fear" was already present at the district under prior leaders, many told the Inlander that things got worse under Clark's leadership.
In one incident, after the Inlander reported on two district leaders being terminated and escorted out of the building in December, Clark called the cops and asked them to come do an in-person investigation to find out who recorded her during a staff meeting.
Lutz filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against the district and Clark as an individual earlier this year. The case has been moved to the U.S. District Court of Eastern Washington.
