Dive Brief:
- The CHRO of the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority allegedly admitted the existence of a hostile work environment at the organization that protected harassers from consequences, according to a lawsuit filed April 10 by a group of current and former employees.
- Plaintiffs in Garner v. New Orleans Regional Transit Authority also claimed that the CHRO — as captured in a series of audio recordings of several executives — acknowledged violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act as well as retaliation against employees who raised concerns about RTA’s employment practices.
- The lawsuit alleged a wide range of claims including discrimination, retaliation, assault and battery as well as violations of the FLSA, Family and Medical Leave Act and Equal Pay Act, among other laws. The plaintiffs seek monetary and injunctive relief in addition to a jury trial. An RTA spokesperson declined to comment.
Dive Insight:
The plaintiffs cited at least nine separate audio recordings that featured conversations with executives including the CHRO, chief transit officer and other RTA managers and directors. The recordings “constitute direct evidence of discriminatory intent, retaliatory animus, deliberate indifference, and willful violations of federal and state law,” plaintiffs claimed.
For instance, when one plaintiff asked the CHRO about the status of his complaints regarding the use of homophobic slurs by co-workers and an incident of assault against him, the CHRO allegedly said that harassers “feel comfortable in the culture they’re in, they’re protected,” while adding that she was “trying to help change that culture.”
Separately, a plaintiff raised concerns that RTA supervisors were misclassified under the FLSA as nonexempt hourly employees who performed “management type duties” or, in some cases, improperly classified them as exempt. The CHRO allegedly acknowledged those concerns in one recorded conversation and said that RTA could “get in trouble” for the misclassification.
Employers may be found liable for harassment by employees if they knew, or should have known, about the harassment and failed to take prompt action to correct the harassment, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Moreover, courts may find a hostile work environment when harassment is so severe or pervasive that a reasonable person would consider it to be hostile.
An HR department’s prompt response to harassment can be a defense against hostile work environment claims. In one 2021 decision, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that an employer was not liable for harassment because its HR team interviewed both the harasser and the plaintiff within one week of the plaintiff’s report, which led to the end of the allegedly harassing behavior shortly thereafter.
