A lawsuit filed against The Acequia Institute and its president and founder, Devon Peña, that alleges discrimination due to sex and race, workplace harassment, and breach of contract is set for a jury trial this fall in Costilla County District Court.
Addelina Lucero of Taos filed the lawsuit under the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act and claims she “was subjected to demeaning insults, verbal attacks and harassment that were calculated to and did marginalize, segregate and undermine her contract of employment based on her sex and on stereotypical and disparaging views of women and Native Americans.”
Lucero was part of the team that worked to land a $1.5 million grant from the Colorado Health Foundation to help acquire, renovate and operate the former R&R Market – now reopened as the San Luis Peoples Market. The grant application was filed as the San Luis Food Sovereignty Initiative and was awarded in December of 2021.
“We are aware of the situation. As a matter of policy, we do not comment on litigation related to current or prior grantees,” said Taryn Fort, senior director of communications and influence for the Colorado Health Foundation.
A status hearing on the case is scheduled for September, with a 4-day jury trial on the district court docket for November. Peña said he wouldn’t comment until after litigation.
The scheduled jury trial comes nearly three years after Lucero first filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Division, alleging discrimination. Then in November of 2023, the state civil rights division issued its “Notice of a Right to Sue.”
The lawsuit presents a timeline of Lucero’s employment as The Acequia Institute’s community and education coordinator starting in December 2021 until she was fired on July 15, 2022, which the lawsuit claims was an unjust firing by Peña. It seeks damages for lost wages, and punitive damages for “willful and/or reckless violation” of the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act.
“As a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s unlawful discriminatory treatment, Ms. Lucero has suffered past and future lost wages, diminished reputation and other pecuniary losses, mental and emotional pain and suffering, mental anguish, anxiety, inconvenience, loss of enjoyment of life, and other non-pecuniary losses, and caused her to incur attorney’s fees and legal costs,” the lawsuit claims.
Lucero says she was hired part-time under a two-year contract at a pay rate of $2,708.33 per month, and that prior to submission of the grant application, she worked through the summer of 2021 with Peña and The Acequia Institute’s community organizer, Shirley Romero Otero, to plan the food sovereignty project.
“Ms. Lucero was recruited to TAI due to her reputation, knowledge, skill and connections in the Indigenous Food Sovereignty and sustainability movements,” according to the filing.
In July 2022, following what she described as a “hostile and offensive working environment,” Lucero said she sought a meeting with The Acequia Institute’s board “to discuss Dr. Peña’s abusive and discriminatory behavior…”
“As a Native woman I am exhausted with Devons total lack of respwct [sic] for his behavior towards me and only me. He does not talk this way to anyone [sic] other employee,” Lucero wrote in an email to the board.
She requested dates and times to meet with the board, according to the lawsuit.
Board member Elisa Sabotini spoke to Lucero in response, but the board did not meet with her and took no remedial action, according to the filing. It then claims: “One or more board members notified Dr. Peña of Ms. Lucero’s protected conduct in reporting his harassment and abuse against her as a Native American woman.”
“On July 15, 2022, just nine days after Ms. Lucero contacted the board, and just 10 days after she left the staff meeting in opposition to his hostile and abusive treatment, Dr. Peña retaliated by emailing her a termination letter which stated, as follows: ‘This letter is written to inform you of your termination as a member of The Acequia Institute Local Projects Team-San Luis Food Sovereignty Initiative, effective immediately.’”
The San Luis Peoples Market opened in May of this year after 3 and a half years of renovation. Over the past three summers, The Acequia Institute and Peña have developed a young farmers program and focused on SNAP nutrition education with guest chefs.