Pittsburgh’s Human Relations Commission today announced that it found in favor of a dog walker who accused a Department of Public Works (DPW) employee of using a homophobic slur, awarding the complainant $10,000 and ordering improved training in the department.
The case was brought by Michelle Cook, of Sewickley, who said a parks maintenance manager made a reference to her perceived sexual orientation and punched her during a dispute over whether she could walk 12 dogs on a Highland Park hockey court. The 2024 incident led to a two-day hearing of the commission in December.
The commission concluded that the incident constituted discrimination based on presumed sexual orientation through statements and aggression. In addition to $10,000 to address embarrassment and humiliation, the commission ruled that the city must pay Cook’s attorney fees.
The commission also orders the city to:
- Inform its employees that they are liable under the city’s code barring discrimination
- Train all public works staff on public engagement, discrimination liability, conflict de-escalation and trauma-informed communication
- Retrain public works supervisors on investigation of incidents and disciplinary processes
- Install signage where dogs are not permitted.
Mayor Corey O’Connor’s administration had no immediate comment in response to questions from Public Source, and a spokesperson said officials were still reviewing the decision. The incident occurred during the tenure of then-Mayor Ed Gainey.
Rich Lord is the managing editor at Pittsburgh’s Public Source and can be reached at rich@publicsource.org.
This article first appeared on Pittsburgh’s Public Source and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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