Following pay dispute, Douglas County District Attorney resigns from KU law school
Douglas County District Attorney, Suzanne Valdez announced Friday that she has resigned from her teaching job at the University of Kansas law school.
The decision comes several weeks after the university placed Valdez on administrative leave and threatened to fire her over her actions in a pay dispute.
Valdez had withheld grades from her students in a class, she said, because the course exceeded her contractual obligations and law school officials decided she was not owed overload pay. That was because she would not be finishing the academic year when she became District Attorney, officials said.
Valdez had planned to take a semester off and return to teach one or two classes a semester.
At the time, Valdez, who is Latina, said she believed the university was retaliating and discriminating against her. She has outspokenly criticized KU for its handling of sexual assault complaints, especially as it relates to a former student criminally charged and investigated for falsely reporting rape. Those charges were later dropped.
In a statement at the time, KU said Valdez had misrepresented the circumstances of the dispute and inappropriately involved her students in the matter.
In an interview, Friday, Valdez said the dispute had not been resolved but she chose to leave KU nonetheless.
“I didn’t want to spend the time or energy going through what I think would be a sham process anyways,” Valdez said. “This is actually better for me, it’s better for my office.
“I just don’t need the aggravation anymore.”
Valdez said the same issues related to racial and gender equity that caused her to run for District Attorney led her to leave the University.
“It is unfortunate that KU refuses to make positive changes on these very important university and community issues,” Valdez said in a news release Friday that called on KU to collaborate with her office to make the county safer.
KU did not directly respond to Valdez’s comments Friday.
“We wish Suzanne well in her new role,” said KU spokesman Joe Monaco in an email.
