Appraisal Institute Executive Sued For Harassment Keeps Job, Will Skip Public Duties

The vice president of the Appraisal Institute has agreed to step away from any front-facing role as the trade group investigates a string of harassment claims, but he hasn't resigned or been removed from his position.

Craig Steinley will “step away from his public AI officer appearances, effective immediately,” according to a statement posted to LinkedIn by Appraisal Institute President Paula Konikoff. 

AI has said it’s investigating claims from a dozen women in a New York Times report that was published the same day that Cindy Chance, the group’s former CEO, filed a suit alleging sexual harassment. 

“He said he makes this choice out of consideration for and in the interest of not being a distraction to the important and ongoing work of the organization and will cooperate with any investigatory effort,” Konikoff wrote. 

Steinley and his attorney Craig Capilla didn’t respond to Bisnow’s request for comment early Tuesday. 

“In terms of stepping back, he will not represent AI at public events,” an AI spokesperson said in a statement Tuesday morning. “He will perform the other duties assigned to the Vice President as an elected officer.”

AI, which has 16,000 members and provides continuing education courses and testing for the industry, committed to conducting an investigation “to understand the facts and circumstances” alleged in The Times’ reporting, a spokesperson for the agency told Bisnow last week. 

In her post on Monday, Konikoff said the 28-member board of directors had formed a task force of nonofficer directors to work with outside counsel to reexamine its policies, procedures and protocols. That committee will report its findings to the board, and the board will determine what reforms, if any, are needed. 

“Please know that the Board is moving as quickly and thoughtfully as possible, but this will take time,” she wrote. 

The response to Konikoff’s message was largely negative, with appraisers responding to her post asking for more accountability and transparency. 

“This is a noxious smokescreen that members can see right through,” Chance told Bisnow in a statement Tuesday. “He remains at the control center of the organization.  How can this person and other current officers, even begin to respond to very serious claims about their behavior?” 

Chance, who was ousted from AI in what she described as a secret board meeting after pushing for reform, filed a lawsuit May 8 outlining her experiences with Steinley — who she says groped her and made frequent inappropriate comments  — along with details of other female staff members who had reportedly told management about situations that made them uncomfortable. 

Chance told The Times she felt forced to approve a six-figure settlement of a sexual harassment claim against Steinley while CEO. 

“Mr. Steinley wholly denies any allegations of any unwanted touching or harassment. It simply did not occur,” Capilla told The Times in a statement when the allegations were first reported. 

Across court documents and personal accounts, women described a permissive environment at AI, where Steinley’s inappropriate behavior was well known but left unaddressed. Despite the complaints reportedly lodged, Chance told Bisnow last week that she reviewed Steinley’s personnel file while she was CEO and found no record of any past incidents. 

The organization is also accused in a separate lawsuit filed in March of knowingly providing faulty test results to state agencies responsible for providing appraiser certifications. In that case, Alissa Akins, the former director of education and publications, alleges she was terminated from her job for reporting the errors and working to fix them. 

The suit says that Akins uncovered the issue in September 2024 and found that it had been producing incorrect results since at least 2020. She alleges that executives at AI were aware of the misreporting, and when Akins flagged it, she was told the situation was a “don’t ask, don’t tell type of policy,” according to the suit. 

“I would characterize their failure to fix the many problems my client found as laziness,” Jordan Matyas, an attorney representing Akins, said in an interview with Bisnow in March. “I don't believe the intent was to deceive the state. It was that they did not want to put in the time and effort to fix the problems.”