This story was updated at 8:55 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 5 to include a statement from the governor’s office.
The state of Iowa will pay $600,000 to settle a wrongful termination lawsuit brought by a former communications director for the Iowa Department of Public Health (IDPH), who claimed she was forced to resign for attempting to comply with Iowa’s open records law.
State officials did not admit to any wrongdoing by entering the settlement agreement, which was approved Wednesday with a 2-1 vote by the State Appeal Board.
Polly Carver-Kimm alleged in her 2020 lawsuit that she was forced out of her job as IDPH communications director for working to fulfill journalists’ requests for public records.
Carver-Kimm said she handled public records requests for 13 years, which included sending records to an assistant attorney general for redaction and approval before providing them to the public.
She said as the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, Gov. Kim Reynolds’ administration “sought to slow, stifle and otherwise divert the free flow of information to the media (and public) concerning the spread of COVID-19 and the state of Iowa’s response to the ongoing pandemic.”
Carver-Kimm alleged IDPH officials began to remove and restrict her job duties as she pushed to fulfill records requests from local and national news outlets.
Days after she provided annual abortion statistics to a reporter, which showed abortions were increasing in Iowa at the time, Carver-Kimm claimed she was told she could resign or be terminated due to “restructuring.” She ultimately chose to resign so that she would not forfeit her vacation time. Her lawsuit argued the state lacked any legitimate reason to terminate her employment.
Thomas Duff, Carver-Kimm’s attorney, said he was pleased with the settlement.
“She was fired more than five years ago for simply doing her job,” he said. “As the records custodian for the Department of Public Health, it was her responsibility to make sure that the public’s business remained public. She did exactly that at great cost to herself and her family. Iowa needs more public servants with principle and conviction like Polly Carver-Kimm.”
Mason Mauro, a spokesperson for Gov. Kim Reynolds, said the state continues to deny that any employee of the IDPH or the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services violated the law.
“Like businesses and organizations everywhere, the state occassionally settles lawsuits to mitigate risk and avoid the cost and uncertainty of litigation,” he said. “Settlements are not admissions of wrongdoing — they are practical decisions made in the best interests of taxpayers.”
The lawsuit named former IDPH Director Gerd Clabaugh and former department officials Sarah Reisetter and Susan Dixon as defendants.
It previously named Gov. Kim Reynolds and her office’s former communications director Pat Garrett, but the Iowa Supreme Court ruled in 2023 that they could be dismissed from Carver-Kimm’s lawsuit.
At a State Appeal Board meeting Wednesday afternoon, State Treasurer Roby Smith and Department of Management Director Kraig Paulsen voted to approve the settlement. State Auditor Rob Sand voted against it.
Sand, a Democrat running for governor, said in a statement he is “disgusted that taxpayers should be forced to foot the bill.”
“I voted against the settlement because Iowa taxpayers shouldn’t have to keep paying for intentional and repeated violations of the law,” he said. “This is the fourth settlement related to open records violations by Gov. Reynolds and her administration, which have cost Iowans about $800,000. The law allows them to be held personally liable, meaning they should write the checks, not taxpayers.”
In a separate case, the Iowa Supreme Court found Reynolds’ failure to respond to many records requests for over a year during the pandemic violated the open records law. The state later paid $174,000 in attorney fees to settle three lawsuits accusing Reynolds of violating the state’s public records law.
Sand said holding officials personally liable for breaking the law could help deter future violations.
“Iowa’s public servants deserve better than to be used as pawns in Rob Sand’s political games,” said Mauro, Reynolds’ spokesperson.
