Rhode Island
Paid to Stay Home, Paid to Go: Providence Gives Its On-Leave DPW Deputy $123,819 and a Ribbon-Cutting Invite—and Still Won’t Say Why
What happened
On Monday, Oct. 5, WPRI’s Target 12 reported that Maureen McManus, deputy director of Providence’s Department of Public Works, is no longer employed by the city. McManus earned $128,153 a year and had been on paid leave since Jan. 10, 2026. The city has never said why. According to documents Target 12 obtained, she signed a separation agreement in late September citing “an irretrievable breakdown in the working relationship.”
The terms are now public. The city agreed to pay McManus $123,819, plus any unused vacation and floating-holiday time, $2,000 toward health care, and $3,500 to her attorney, Sonja Deyoe. The agreement says the separation was “in lieu of termination for reasons not involving misconduct” and that she “resigned from city employment in good standing.” In return, McManus agreed not to sue the city “or anyone connected to it for any reason.” Her resignation letter is one sentence and gives no reason. The city also has to send her an invitation to the ribbon-cutting for the new DPW complex once one is scheduled.
The paper trail: the City Council’s Committee on Claims and Pending Suits met on the matter five times starting in June and approved the deal in executive session on Sept. 16. Chairman John Goncalves said the committee couldn’t comment on decisions made in executive session. The city’s chief people officer signed the agreement on Sept. 21, and the city solicitor approved it on Sept. 29. McManus had held the deputy post since May 2021 and was second in command to DPW Director Patricia Coyne-Fague, who was appointed in 2023 under Mayor Brett Smiley.
Original reporting
Read the underlying sources:
Earlier Virtue Forge coverage: Still Won’t Say Why: Providence OKs a Secret Settlement
Virtue Forge commentary
Last month we noted that the council approved this deal without saying what it cost. Now we know: close to a year’s pay on top of eight months of pay for no work, plus legal fees, health money, and a seat at the next ribbon-cutting. And the city still won’t say what broke down or who decided it was cheaper to pay her to leave than to fix it or fire her.
“We don’t comment on personnel matters” is a reasonable rule for protecting an employee’s privacy. It isn’t a reason to keep the public from knowing why a six-figure management job sat empty, on full pay, through a winter of storm-cleanup complaints. A private business that handled a manager this way would answer to its owners. In Providence the owners are the taxpayers, and their representatives handled it in closed session.
Humble, competent government acts quickly when a working relationship fails, tells the public what it can, and doesn’t leave the payroll running for eight months while a committee keeps meeting. Whoever runs City Hall in January should publish every separation agreement and the total cost of paid leave for top managers. If a deal can’t survive that kind of daylight, it shouldn’t be signed.