A federal judge in Statesville has closed the lawsuit Alanda Richardson, the longtime head of the now-abolished Hickory Public Housing Authority, filed against the city of Hickory and the authority’s board after she lost her job.
U.S. District Judge Matthew E. Orso signed the 15-page order on Sept. 28. He dismissed Richardson’s federal civil-rights claim against both defendants and declined to rule on her breach-of-contract claims, sending those out of federal court without prejudice. That means the contract dispute was not decided on its merits and could be brought again in North Carolina state court.
What the judge decided
Richardson’s amended complaint argued the city and the housing authority broke her employment contract and that race played a part in the decisions, a claim under the federal law that guarantees an equal right to make and enforce contracts.
Orso agreed with Richardson on two early points. He rejected the authority’s argument that she sued the wrong entity by naming “the Board” instead of the authority itself, calling that a mistake an amendment could fix. He also found she had identified a specific federal right.
Where the claim failed, the judge wrote, was the link to official city policy. Under long-standing U.S. Supreme Court precedent, a city or public agency can be held liable for a civil-rights violation only when it flows from an official policy or custom, or from a decision by someone with final authority to set policy. Richardson’s own complaint described the mayor’s actions as approved by City Council and said both defendants were under the control of the mayor and council, which the judge said meant she had not alleged that either defendant or the mayor was the final policymaker.
Only the housing authority had asked for dismissal. The city had filed an answer instead. Orso dismissed the identical claim against the city on his own motion, finding it had the same defect.
With no federal claim left, he declined to keep the state contract claims and directed the clerk to close the case.
How the case got here
The order summarizes Richardson’s allegations, which a court accepts as true only for purposes of ruling on a motion to dismiss. According to that summary, Richardson led the authority for about 26 years and signed a contract in June 2023 that ran into mid-2028. In October 2024, five commissioners, all of them Black, approved an addendum spelling out her pay if control of the authority changed or it was abolished. The mayor then told those five he planned to remove them for ethical misconduct, and they resigned. Richardson said she learned she had been terminated from a local news report.
The city has given its own account. In a Jan. 10, 2025, release, Hickory said City Council first took up abolishing the authority on Oct. 1, 2024, citing low use of federal Section 8 housing vouchers and complaints from residents, and that five long-serving board members resigned Nov. 4, 2024. The city also released statements from an authority credit card in Richardson’s name covering July 2022 to September 2024 and said they showed multiple questionable charges.
On Jan. 21, 2025, City Council voted unanimously to adopt a resolution abolishing the Hickory Public Housing Authority effective July 1, 2025, and handing its duties to the Western Piedmont Council of Governments, subject to approval from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, according to the council’s minutes. The council named the regional council’s executive director interim director of the authority during the transfer.
The authority’s main job by then was running the Section 8 voucher program with private landlords. City Manager Warren Wood told council that the authority had not owned the former public housing units in Ridgeview, Ridgecrest or West Hickory for about seven years.
Earlier coverage: WPCOG housing authority sets July 9 hearing on raising minimum rent to $50
Source note: As of publication, Catawba First News had verified this story independently against the Sept. 28, 2026, Memorandum & Order in Richardson v. Hickory Public Housing Authority Board and City of Hickory, No. 5:25-cv-00151 (W.D.N.C.), the City of Hickory’s Jan. 10, 2025, release, and the Jan. 21, 2025, City Council minutes. The story was first surfaced by a local news report.
