Kansas agency settles with Army National Guard soldier after eliminating her job

TOPEKA — An Army National Guard employee who accused a Kansas agency of eliminating her job because of an upcoming military deployment will receive $35,000 in a settlement agreement announced Tuesday.

The U.S. Department of Justice sued the Kansas Department of Health and Environment on behalf of Staff Sgt. Stacy Gonzales, claiming the agency violated terms of a federal law that protects employment rights for service members.

Gonzales was working as a local disease intervention specialist at Finney County Department of Health, a position that was under the control and supervision of KDHE, a DOJ news release said. KDHE eliminated grant funding for her position when Gonzales told them she would be deploying, the news release said.

The case was filed in 2022 and went through numerous court actions on its way to being settled. KDHE argued that it wasn’t Gonzales’ employer because it was the grant funder, an opinion upheld by a federal district judge.

In January, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the lawsuit filed in 2022 was improperly dismissed by the district judge.

The settlement agreement requires KDHE to update its Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 — the federal law that protects service members — policies and procedures and to train all KDHE employees on those updated processes, the news release said.

“National Guard members are called citizen-soldiers because they must strike a balance between fulfilling obligations to civilian careers with those of military service. As a reservist myself, I know this is no easy task,” said Ryan Kriegshauser, U.S. attorney for Kansas, in the news release. “When guard members deploy, they shouldn’t have to worry that their livelihoods will be stripped away while they are off serving our country. Our government put laws in place to protect the employment rights of servicemembers.”