VICTORVILLE — Angela Valles, the director of administration for Victor Valley Wastewater Reclamation Authority, has been placed on paid administrative leave while investigators probe claims by several former employees that she engaged in bullying and other unethical behavior.
Questions about Valles were spurred by her absence at Thursday's board meeting. General Manager Logan Olds deferred questions about her absence to VVWRA’s legal counsel Piero Dallarda, who said he had “no idea” where she was before declining to comment further. VVWRA board member Jim Kennedy confirmed to the Daily Press later Thursday that Olds sent an email to the board around March 5 informing them Valles had been placed on leave a few days earlier.
“It was made at the suggestion of the investigator,” Kennedy said. “There was no decision by the board to make any decision as to Angela.”
The move came not long after the board on Feb. 27 approved San Bernardino-based law firm Mundell, Odlum and Haws to investigate the claims made by seven former VVWRA employees at a
.
On Feb. 19, ex-workers addressed the board or submitted statements that described an allegedly hostile work environment perpetuated mostly by Valles. They said Olds and Director of Operations Gilbert Perez turned a blind eye to the situation.
Valles last month adamantly denied the accusations — the most alarming including that she falsified time sheets, retaliated against certain employees or targeted them to be fired and released confidential personnel and medical information to unauthorized persons. Valles has suggested that she is a target of a political assassination and being “punished” for being a whistle-blower.
On Thursday, Valles confirmed that she was on paid administrative leave, saying she felt the action was “totally inappropriate,” because Olds “runs the organization” and Perez is his second-in-command.
“It will be found that everything was done through legal counsel and the board approved everything,” she said. “I’m being punished for doing exactly what I was asked to do: Restructuring the organization and making it successful.”
While praising the accomplishments of top brass and current employees at the agency, Valles said she had garnered “a slew of enemies” because she had focused on accountability since joining VVWRA in 2005. She pointed to the agency’s troubles that she detailed in the January 2010 issue of Wastewater Professional magazine.
“Just two and a half years after VVWRA initiated its comprehensive new hiring and operational policies it has saved taxpayers a staggering $2.5 million,” she wrote.
The agency has also improved during her time from 21 OSHA violations in 2005 to being “the most innovative plant in the world” and frequently awarded for its finances, she said, adding that most of the ex-workers who have lobbed complaints were not even under her supervision.