Justice Sues City Over Protection : Backs Employees in Sex
June 2, 2001
Katia Hetter
After welfare recipient Maria Gonzalez complained in 1997 that her supervisor
at the city Human Resources Administration grabbed her and called her names
after she refused his advances, she was allegedly told by his boss to handle him
by herself.
When she and three other women filed complaints with the U.S. Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission, the city claimed that welfare recipients
working for benefits were not city employees and had no legal protections from
sex discrimination at work.
The U.S. Department of Justice didn’t buy it.
The Justice Department filed a lawsuit in Manhattan federal court Thursday to
force the city to give workfare participants the same civil rights protections
awarded city employees.
Filed by Mary Jo White, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York,
the lawsuit claims the city and the city Housing Authority violated federal civil
rights law by failing to protect welfare-to-work participants from sexual
harassment.
The complaint requests that the court award compensatory damages to the
women; bar the defendants from discriminatory employment practices in the
city’s workfare program; and direct the city “to prevent and to remedy
employment discrimination” in the program, which has about 23,000
participants.
A spokesman for White's office, who said a hearing had not yet been scheduled,
had no further comment.
The city Corporation Counsel and Giuliani’s office did not return calls for
comment, but lawyers for the city have said the women could bring criminal
charges or file private lawsuits against the people they say harassed them.
Gonzalez and thousands of other participants in the city’s “Work Experience
Program” were required to work in city agencies or other institutions as a
condition of receiving welfare benefits. If they failed to do so, they risked losing
part or all of their benefits.
The EEOC first ruled in 1999 that the Giuliani administration violated federal
law by not informing workfare participants of their rights under Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964, and by not providing a way for them to register
discrimination complaints.
Before asking the Justice Department to file a lawsuit, the law requires that the
EEOC attempt to negotiate with the city to eliminate the discrimination.
Lawyers close to the case said the city refused to cooperate, so the agency
requested that White file a lawsuit.
There was a slight delay while White, a Clinton appointee, waited for permission
from U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft to file the lawsuit.
“The federal government has been very clear in a number of different places that
Title VII applies to workfare workers, and we’re very pleased that they didn’t
decide to backtrack,” said Martha Davis, legal director at the NOW Legal
Defense and Education Fund, which represents another city workfare
participant with a similar case. “This shows how extreme the Giuliani
administration position is, that even Ashcroft doesn't buy it.”
