The expensive part is almost over. Modesto is wrapping up four complicated lawsuits filed against the city in 2004 and 2005, collectively costing millions of dollars in legal fees, settlements and judgments. Some of the bills have not arrived, including an expected $1 million for the plaintiffs' legal fees from a voting rights lawsuit. The latest ruling came Thursday, when a jury sided with two female Finance Department employees who sued the city claiming they were underpaid compared with a male counterpart.That verdict could cost the city $189,100 for the judgment and at least twice as much in legal fees, depending on the outcome of Modesto's appeal.
It follows a year in which Modesto settled a gender discrimination lawsuit for $3.25 million, beat a lawsuit claiming it provided substandard services in unincorporated county pockets and lost an attempt to overturn a state voting law. Those cases were filed from June 2004 to July 2005. Unlike most claims against Modesto, they required the city to seek outside attorneys and experts for its defense. The charges were $1.7 million in the voting case and nearly $390,000 in the wage bias trial that ended this week. "There's no reason for anyone to expect that we're going to be hit by those megabucks issues again," City Councilman Bob Dunbar said, calling the confluence of those cases unusual.At the same time, the city attorney's office advanced a lawsuit against companies that produced dry-cleaning solvents polluting Modesto's groundwater and soil.
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