Remember Dorothy Dugger, the ex-BART general manager whose messy firing back in 2011 ended up in her walking out the door with a $920,000 payoff? Turns out that wasn’t all. As part of the deal, she was quietly left on the payroll while doing no work, piling on yet more gold-plated pension benefits and accruing more vacation on 19 months spent not working. Upshot: she was BART’s highest-paid employee last year, hauling in $333,000. For zero work.
An excerpt from the Mercury News’ weekender:
In 2012 alone Dugger's gross pay could have bought 52,837 round-trip BART tickets between downtown Oakland and San Francisco's Financial district. She even received more pay than the person who replaced her to run the Bay Area commuter railroad, General Manager Grace Crunican, who took home $316,000.
Without leaving her home in Oakland's Crocker Highlands neighborhood, Dugger reaped the astonishing windfall by cashing in more than 3,100 vacation hours, saved during her 20 years with BART.
My favorite graph in the piece:
"Wow," said James Fang, a BART board member who tried to oust Dugger. "She was still on the payroll? I did not know this. It's startling."
Fare increases, indeed.
Image: ABC 7
