web design civil lawsuit threat

[vaguy70]

Long and short, this is my concern and situation...

-As a supervisor for a youth sports association, I took it upon myself one
year to create a website to assist in providing info about the area and the
the county programs. The association agreed to pay the "rental fee" for
the hosting of the site to allow for more storage space.
-I aslo created a registration database to make sign-ups more efficient
-For the past 3 years I have dedicated a great amount of time updating
each of these items.
-The county has paid my monthly salary, with no extra from them or the
association for that work, as neither was a required job responsibility.
-After being "replaced" by the county, the association president has
threatened a civil suit to "get back" the website and database.
-I feel since these items were created by me to make my position more
efficient, they don't belong to the association.

What legal standing do I have, or what legal standing does this volunteer association board have in suing me?

Thank you for any assistance you may provide.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

1) Is your job description and the ownership of the site with rental agreement in writing?
2) Was the database created during work hours?
3) Would any reasonable person assume that the county would own the web site?

My guess is the answer to the first question is no and last two is yes. I don't know all the facts so it's very possible there is more to your question, but let's talk straight and ask some hard questions.

If the agreement was not in writing, you're going to have a difficult chance of proving that the database - which related to your job - is owned by you. This is because it looks to me as if it relates to your job and your employer owns the product of your work by default.

Second, were you not cultivating this site on salaried time? I'm guessing that the association paid for hosting fees for the site and the county paid your salary. Exactly how do you come to say that none of the work on the site and the fruits of the labor belong to you? You didn't even pay the hosting charges to keep it up. You were on salary to do a job directly related to this one. Are you saying that you believe that you created a script and then sold it to the county for a year so that they could just have the site up like a rented yellow pages?

The last question makes it next to impossible for me to believe you, with what you've told me, that any reasonable person would have agreed to this deal. It reminds me of the domain registration scam that lasted a long time, where hosting companies would promise free domains with a web site hosting agreement. What would happen is that the client didn't know that the host would register the domain in ITS name, not the client, and then hold it hostage later when the client's web site was more valuable and the client wanted to leave. Essentially the argument was that it was a rental with an option to buy the $10-20 name even though the client paid much more in hosting fees. It was obvious that this was a scam to mislead the consumer.

But in your case I find it even more troubling that somehow you were being paid to keep up the web site but somehow would keep all the benefits of the site later. If you got $100 for the year I'd understand. But legally nor logically I can't understand how you can make your case that it makes sense for you to own the data. I hope for your case you didn't burn bridges just yet and perhaps might want to think about what the deal really was - or explain to us more of the circumstances which may back up what you claim.

 

[vaguy70]

I certainly appreciate your insights, and you do make some valid observations. As I may have mentioned, I created the website and database on my own - without compensation, and these items were not part of my job description.

The databse was created to allow for more efficient registrations; the association has all the information needed to created a database of their own, on their own. The database and website were created and maintained on nights and weekends, as this was a part-time job.

There is nothing in writing that says these items were part of my job responsibilities. I'm fine with turning over the "domain," but without the work I provided, since I was not compensated for the work. Likewise, I don't feel the new "supervisor" should benefit from my work (website and database); he should have to create items on his own to prove his worth. Again, my thoughts, and I certainly appreciate any further direction you may provide.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

I certainly appreciate your insights, and you do make some valid observations. As I may have mentioned, I created the website and database on my own - without compensation, and these items were not part of my job description.

What was your job? If it included the intake of registration information, it's easily arguable that designing and maintaining the web site was obviously a new part of your job.

The databse was created to allow for more efficient registrations; the association has all the information needed to created a database of their own, on their own. The database and website were created and maintained on nights and weekends, as this was a part-time job.

Why did you create the database and web site? Obviously it was for the job. The web site allowed the results of the job to proceed more easily.

There is nothing in writing that says these items were part of my job responsibilities. I'm fine with turning over the "domain," but without the work I provided, since I was not compensated for the work. Likewise, I don't feel the new "supervisor" should benefit from my work (website and database); he should have to create items on his own to prove his worth. Again, my thoughts, and I certainly appreciate any further direction you may provide.

The fact that you purchased the domain name in your own name shows bad faith on the surface. If part of your job was to maintain the database and, on the weekends, you created a site that you provided to your job to make the work more efficient then it's up to you to prove that your office knew that the web site was going to leave with you when you left the job. What about the database? Do you think that is somehow yours too? Honestly, I don't know how you thought that the web site that was created specifically for your job is somehow your own property - especially when you seem not to have clarified anything.

I honestly haven't heard a single reason, rationally and logically (forget about legally), that explains to me how you had expectations of keeping the site and why it should be yours. It sounds to me like you are not happy about being terminated and this is your way of not wanting them to benefit from your efforts without showing their appreciation for your past work. Just the way I see it and likely the way any judge would as well, IMHO.