Boise’s Central District Health settles with employees who raised discrimination complaints
In the past year, Central District Health has paid out nearly $250,000 in settlements to three former employees who had raised concerns about discrimination against Spanish-speaking workers, according to a lawsuit.
Cass Thompson, who worked with customer service representatives, sued the Boise-based public health agency in U.S. District Court earlier this year, alleging agency officials violated the Americans with Disabilities Act and retaliated against her when they fired her after she ran out of family medical leave. She received a payout of $82,500, records obtained by the Idaho Statesman showed.
The settlements, obtained by the Statesman through a public records request, do not include details of the employees’ complaints against the agency. But Thompson’s lawsuit mentioned the two other former employees who received the settlements by name and outlined their involvement in reporting allegations of discrimination.
Martha Alvarez received a settlement of $85,000. She was suspended and placed on a performance improvement plan after she expressed concerns about a directive not to speak Spanish at work unless employees were serving a Spanish-speaking client, according to Thompson’s complaint.
Hayden Falkner, a former program manager, received a $75,000 payout in November. He reported concerns about discrimination from Alvarez and other employees, and was accused of “gossiping” about the English-only directive, according to Thompson’s lawsuit.
”Although CDH has previously characterized employee discussions of discrimination as ‘gossip,’ such conversations are protected activity under (Equal Employment Opportunity) law,” Falkner told the Statesman in a written statement. “Following my reports, I experienced ongoing retaliation by members of CDH leadership until ultimately resigning from my position.”
Alvarez did not respond to requests for comment.
In the settlements, the health district agreed to the payouts while emphasizing that the documents were “not to be construed as an admission of any liability” on the part of the agency, the records showed.
The Statesman last year reported allegations that CDH had a culture of retaliation from 17 current and former employees, who said public health programs hung on by a thread as workers left in droves. Some said they had faced backlash after raising concerns about discrimination against Spanish-speaking employees; others said they ran into problems after pushing back on CDH actions that violated best practices for public health.
Some, including Thompson, were barred from receiving unemployment benefits after they left, since CDH told the state they were fired for misconduct, records obtained by the Statesman showed. After those employees filed appeals, the state ruled in the employees’ favor.
Several employees laid the blame for the agency’s ”toxic” culture at the feet of Stephanie Myers, a division administrator, and Gary Foote, the district’s human resources officer.
In emailed responses to allegations outlined by the Statesman last year, CDH Director Russ Duke had said he believed problems with the agency’s culture were “limited to a relatively small group of people who worked together,” attributing high turnover to pressure staffers faced during COVID-19.
Employees say CDH discriminated against Spanish speakers
Duke told Thompson she would be “medically laid off” after she asked to extend her medical leave, according to a termination letter Thompson shared with the Statesman last year. She had exhausted her 12 weeks’ worth of family medical leave by May 2023, a year and a half after CDH had received a death threat, and continued to struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder over the incident, according to the lawsuit.
Thompson, through her attorney Erika Birch, in her complaint said her stress was exacerbated when a separate dispute arose with agency leaders over whether workers could speak Spanish in the office.
Thompson in her complaint said Myers told her that workers shouldn’t speak Spanish in the office unless it’s for Spanish-speaking clients. In an email, which former employees provided to the Statesman, Myers acknowledged the concern and told staffers that “the use of Spanish, or any other language, is not prohibited in practice or policy at CDH.” However, staffers should be “inclusive in conversations in business areas within CDH,” and be aware of “the perception that may occur” when speaking a language in the presence of those who don’t understand it, she wrote.
Myers last year directed the Statesman’s questions about the culture at the health district to Duke. Duke, in an email to the Statesman at the time, called the incident about language use a “rumor” that stemmed from a staff misunderstanding of a conversation with Myers.
“There has never been an English-only policy at CDH,” Duke wrote. “It is common now and has always been common to overhear multiple languages other than English being spoken in work areas, hallways and break rooms at CDH. Nevertheless, it is appropriate to remind staff to be inclusive when questions arise, and that is what we did.”
Accountability Editor Hayat Norimine contributed to this report.
