Barrow County’s embattled human resources director is out.
In a unanimous vote Tuesday night, the Barrow County Board of Commissioners voted to accept the immediate resignation of Norma Jean Brown.
In a second and related vote, with commissioner Eva Elder voting no, the board approved a $38,126 settlement agreement with Brown.
According to the unsigned document, the county government will pay Brown $38,126 for six months’ severance pay and six months of health care premiums.
The county’s liability carrier will pay $20,000 to her attorneys, Buckley & Klein LLP.
In addition, the board agreed to amend the county’s retirement plan at its next meeting Oct. 26 to recognize Brown “as fully vested with ten (10) years of service for unreduced benefits at age fifty-five (55).”
To do that, the BOC apparently is adding to her nine years of service as a former commissioner and HR director some earlier stints as a recreation department employee.
Under the agreement, Brown’s departure will be categorized as a resignation. The board also agreed to purge her personnel file of all “documents reflecting negative disciplinary actions or investigations” and to direct all future reference checks only to commissioners Isaiah Berry or Billy Parks, who are to limit their responses to her “dates of employment, job positions held and compensation history.
For more on this story, see the October 13 edition of the Barrow Journal or click here to read the full story online when you subscribe to our new e-edition. 
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By Law -- that's all the information they can give.
A sad but true fact in this situation, is that if the BOC had a "Air tight" case against Ms. Brown they would not have settled at all. They would have presented the evidence in court and won the decision outright, not having to pay her anything at all.
Most likely, 2 factors came into play regarding their decision to settle:
1. The cost of paying for additional litigation to prove their case vs. a smaller figure to settle. Simple and straight economics. "Get out as cheap as you can".
2. Ms. Brown had enough of a strong EEOC complaint, against the BOC to drag the litigation out for months, costing the taxpayers of Barrow County, while she paid nothing due to the fact that the EEOC would have prosecuted the case themselves.
Purging of negative personnel information is often a bargaining chip in lieu of asking for additional compensation. It is simply cheaper to purge a file than to drag out the litigation.
I suspect reason #2 was the determining factor in the settlement decision. The only folks that know for sure are the parties and lawyers for both sides, and I am sure that they also have a confidentiality agreement in place that will prohibit all parties from disclosing any information. Is this fair? Probably not, but that is the current climate of the litigation process that we live in.............
Respectfully submitted,
DuWayne Anderson
Winder, GA