White Council Members Ousted City Manager For 'Blacking Up' City: Lawsuit

A former Hopewell employee has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit alleging that she was fired by white council members who said she was "Blacking up" the Virginia city.

According to WRIC, former Hopewell city manager Concetta Manker is seeking over $6.8 million in damages after she was allegedly fired "without cause" in early May. Hopewell City Council members voted 4-3 to terminate Manker, along with city clerk Brittani Williams, in a move many residents believe was racially motivated.

“I’ll tell you right now — y’all are the four most disgusting individuals in this city,” a constituent said during the May meeting, referring to the four white councilors who voted to terminate Manker and Williams.

Manker became the first Black woman to serve as Hopewell's city manager in July 2023.

“Two years later, however, the City made a different kind of history — a historical act of illegal and unlawful behavior,” her racial discrimination lawsuit reads. “On May 1, 2025, using maneuvers that were blatantly illegal under the governing procedural rules, the City, through its white councilors, unlawfully terminated Dr. Manker as the City Manager and did so based on her race. Indeed, the 4-to-3 termination vote fell strictly along racial lines.”

The suit names the city of Hopewell and the four white council members, Mayor Johnny Partin, Vice-Mayor Rita Joyner and councilors Eonnie Ellis and Susan Daye, as defendants.

Joyner is also being sued for defamation after she allegedly sent an email in August 2024 describing Manker as “incompetent” and claiming she “thwarted" the vice-mayor "at every twist and turn.” The lawsuit also alleges that Joyner accused Manker of "Blacking up" Hopewell by hiring Black employees.

“Joyner’s criticism did not come from a place of good faith,” the lawsuit reads. “Instead, it was part and parcel of her stated beliefs that Dr. Manker did not ‘look like’ a City Manager and ‘we do not want someone like her’ running our City, statements that were interpreted by the listener as racist in nature.”

Manker is also claiming that her termination was unlawful due to procedural elements.

According to the lawsuit, Ellis should not have had a vote in Manker's firing due to conflict of interest. Ellis dually serves as a city councilor and a battalion chief with Hopewell Fire & EMS, making him both Manker’s superior and her subordinate.

The lawsuit also asserts that the vote was "untimely" under Robert's Rules of Order, which govern city council meetings. According to the rules, a council vote can only be reconsidered at the same meeting or the following one. Manker's termination was initially voted on during a February meeting and then reconsidered months later in May.

“While the Council majority’s use of tortured procedural gymnastics to terminate Dr. Manker was by itself illegal, it also revealed the true motive for the vote: racism,” the lawsuit reads. “The 4-3 vote along racial lines was no accident. It was the direct result of racial enmity against Dr. Manker that had been brewing since the very beginning of her tenure (and even before), and it was the inevitable outcome given the racist attitudes of one or more of the white members of the Council majority.”

Maker is seeking $6,850,000 in damages, along with a declaratory judgment that her firing was “invalid, null and void” and that “she is still, and remains, the City Manager for the City of Hopewell.”

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