Former Cleveland Community Police Commission Interim Director Jason Goodrick recently began a new — and apparently final — chapter with the city after agreeing to settle a lawsuit that he filed in 2024 for $75,000.
In May, Goodrick stepped down from the commission staff — which he had led since 2017 — and announced he would take a new position in the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability. That office “leads Cleveland’s efforts to create a greener, more resilient, and equitable city,” according to the web site. His title is resilience specialist.
Goodrick sued the city, Mayor Justin Bibb and six of the commissioners last year, alleging that racial and gender discrimination were behind the mayor’s decision not to confirm him as the permanent director in 2023.
The lawsuit settlement
The settlement includes provisions that require Goodrick to resign from his new, $105,000-per-year role, in the city’s Office of Sustainability, after three years and never seek another position with the city.
A little more than $41,000 of the $75,000 settlement is back wages for two years when Goodrick was paid less than the standard rate for an executive director because he’d been made interim director. The rest of the money goes to his attorneys.
The city admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement. Neither Goodrick nor the mayor’s communication office responded to Signal Cleveland’s requests for further comments.
Lawsuits against employers are often settled, but that usually ends the relationship between the parties, said Eric Chaffee, professor of business law at Case Western Reserve University.
“The resolution in this case is unusual because this individual will remain employed by the city,” Chaffee told Signal Cleveland. “It shows that both parties did not view the relationship as irreconcilable.”
But the requirement to resign was likely a compromise to end the suit, Chaffee speculated.
In the meantime, the Community Police Commission continues to seek a new permanent executive director. In May, the CPC announced that a months-long search had collapsed in part because finalists withdrew from the process. Alix Noureddine, who was the commission’s attorney, is serving as interim executive director.