Complaints of religious discrimination in workplace are increasing
Published: Thursday, November 17, 2011, 6:00 AM Updated: Thursday, November 17, 2011, 7:00 AM
By Marcia Pledger, The Plain Dealer
Joshua Gunter, The Plain Dealer
Suhad Hasan, a former Old Navy employee, sued the store's parent company Gap Inc. last month, saying she was treated unfairly because she wears a head scarf. The Parma resident, who now works as a home health aide, is among a growing number of people nationwide who filed religious-based complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Northeast Ohio native Suhad Hasan, a hijab-wearing Muslim, says neither her head scarf nor her religion should be an issue where she works.
But she said they were while she was a sales associate at the Old Navy clothing store in Santa Clara, Calif., three years ago. Hasan said she was assigned to work in the fitting room and was never offered training for other positions that was given to non-Muslims, despite her repeated requests to be trained.
After several months and still working in the fitting room, Hasan moved back to Ohio, only to be denied what she said was supposed to be an automatic transfer to a job in another Old Navy store. She found herself without a job, all because of what she describes as discrimination because of who she is and what she looks like.
"I was born and raised in the United States and I pay taxes like everybody else," said Hasan, 39, now a Parma resident who last month sued Gap Inc., the parent company of Old Navy. "What I wear on my head and the god that I believe in should not be an issue in the workplace."
The number of complaints like Hasan's is steadily rising. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission statistics show that religious discrimination complaints in workplace settings have more than doubled from a little over a decade ago, resulting in roughly $10 million in settlements. Last year, nearly 3,800 were filed -- 136 of them with the Cleveland EEOC office.
"Religion has increasingly moved into the private sphere, so when it does pop up in the workplace, we're less equipped to deal with it in a rational and even-handed manner," said John Gordon, chairman of the religion department at Baldwin-Wallace College, who believes the increase is a result of being a more multi-cultural, more multi-faith country.
The Gap did not respond to emails or phone calls this week.
Many of the complaints from employees involve wearing head garb or those who say they work for companies that refuse to accommodate their requests for religious days off.
Cynthia Stankiewicz, enforcement manager for the EEOC Cleveland field office, said not allowing time off for religious observances is a common issue. She said many cases come about when employers aren't aware of employees' rights or when employers don't attempt to accommodate requests that do not pose a hardship on the business.
She cited a case where an assistant manager at a local fast-food restaurant fired an employee after only a day on the job after claims that the worker's headscarf was a fire hazard.
"In most cases, employers don't have a good valid job-related reason for religious discrimination," she said. "It's often based on fears, myths and stereotypes."
The law requires employers to make reasonable accommodations to "sincerely held" religious beliefs of employees as long as doing so poses no undue hardship on the employer, EEOC says. When that doesn't happen, EEOC said it steps in but only after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement with the employer.
A few months ago, the commission stepped in and sued a Rent-A-Center in Washington, D.C., on behalf of an employee, saying the company violated federal law when it failed to accommodate the store manager's religious beliefs, and then fired him because of his religion. EEOC charged that the manager, a Seventh-Day Adventist, had asked to be excused from working on Saturdays before sundown, but his request was denied.
Last summer, a Toledo-based nursing home settled a religious discrimination lawsuit, paying the employee $30,000 and offering training to all employees, including managers in the region, on recognizing and preventing religious discrimination, EEOC said.
"An employee should not be forced to choose between his faith and his job," Lynette Barnes, a regional attorney for EEOC, said in a press release involving the Rent-A-Center case.
Still, an employer can turn down a request if that means training someone else, at a substantial cost, to cover for the worker who doesn't want to work on Saturdays for religious reasons, Stankiewicz said.
Also, employers are not required to pay premium or overtime costs in order to accommodate religious needs. Or undue hardships could become an issue if a collective bargaining agreement includes rules regarding seniority and assignments.
"It's a complex thing. Almost every case is unique," said Gordon at Baldwin Wallace. "A particular employer may really have a bias or an employee might be unreasonable."
While employers tend to be familiar with sexual harassment, family leave, age discrimination, and the Americans with Disabilities Act, employers may not even be aware of the law regarding religion in the workplace until they face a religious challenge, said Julia Shearson, executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations-Ohio in Cleveland.
Civil rights attorney and law professor Avery Friedman, who has represented employees for the last four decades, said he's not surprised about the increase in EEOC complaints about religious workplace issues.
"The rise relates to how certain groups are perceived, coupled with people who carry their faith-based precepts and act as missionaries in the workplace," he said.
Since returning to Ohio, Hasan has landed a job as a home health aide. She said she is still shaken by her experience with Old Navy.
"I was raised to respect all religions. But when you attack my hijab, you're demeaning my beliefs and my religion," she said.
© 2011 cleveland.com. All rights reserved.
No comments:
Post a Comment