gender discrimination

Women face Discrimination

In 2008, the university paid $250,000 to settle a sexual harrasment suit filed by the only woman ever hired at UW-Madison to work in a power plant. She complained that the plant supervisor, John Loescher, made repeated sexual advances and then retaliated when she refused him. Loescher was quoted in the press as having said in an email "I respect your answer and have not pushed the issue since then. I'm not gonna chase you and keep bugging you about it."

And depite the fact that Loescher knew this worker was being harrased ("I would hate to be in your shoes, as a female and have to put up with some of the crap you do" he wrote in another email)

One of the woman's co-workers was paid $19,500 to settle the complaint he filed after being repeatedly disciplined for coming to her defense. John Loescher continues supervise a power plant on campus, but he doesn't harras women there any more. There aren't any.

Latinos face discrimination

In 2001, the EEOC found UW-Madison guilty of discrimination when they fired 26 Latino Custodians for non matching Social Security numbers. University administrators checked Social Security numbers, but only for Latinos hired in FP+M within the previous year.

As a result of pressure from supporters of immigrant rights, the university agreed not conduct any such searches in the future and to pay a small cash settlement, $25,000 to the eight workers who actually filed the complaint. They donated one third of the money they received to the Interfaith Coalition for Worker Justice to found a Workers' Rights Center, that continues to provide assistance to low wage non-union workers.

Latino workers continue to suffer discrimination at the UW. The picture above was taken at the Local 171 picnic in 2006. Rick Bundy, the person in the picture, wore a shirt with an anti-immigrant slogan and then picked a fight with some immigrant workers who wee there with their families. At the time, Bundy was represented by Local 171. Since then, he has been hired as a supervisor, despite his known hatred of Latino immigrants.

Workplace Segregation

AFSCME Local 171 represents 1600 workers at UW-Madison in the Blue Collar, Technical, and Security bargaining units. We’re the custodians and the kitchen workers, the lab animal techs and the vet techs, the power plant operators and the parking monitors. We make up a diverse workforce, but we might be the last considered when diversity issues on campus are discussed.

The concentration of people of color and women in the lowest paying jobs is one result of this neglect, and nowhere is this more obvious than in Facilities, Planning, and Management. FP+M employs 584 local 171 members, the most of any employing unit on campus.

The members of Local 171 working in FP+M make up one of the most diverse workforces on campus – 44% people of color and 24% women. This might sound like a good thing, except that of 258 people of color, 248 are custodians and of the 142 women, 135 are custodians. There are large areas of campus with no people of color or women working.

It’s clear that those who do the hiring do not take diversity into account. Surely there have been times when a person of color or a woman was among the most qualified for a job other than Custodian, but very few times when such a person was hired. University leaders need to make it clear this is not acceptable, and that those responsible need to do better.

This situation would be easier to understand if FP+M hadn’t been so prominently in the public eye for cases of discrimination. In 2001, the EEOC found the UW guilty of discrimination after FP+M checked the Social Security numbers of Latino custodians and fired 26 people as a result. In 2008, the university paid $250,000 to settle a sexual harassment suit brought by the only women ever hired in FP+M as a Power Plant Operator. In both these cases, those responsible continued in their positions with no serious consequence. FP+M management claims to have a Diversity Committee, but meetings are closed to the public and no minutes are published.

The university is one of the largest employers in Dane County, and discrimination in hiring re-enforces the divisions in our community. Students of color can’t help but notice the segregation in the workplace, a message that does not make them any more welcome in a predominately white institution.

If UW-Madison is going to be a welcoming, respectful institution, then university administrators need to make it clear to those doing the hiring that a segregated workplace in no longer acceptable.