Company Would Not Give Package Driver Alternate Assignments Despite Doing So for Non-Pregnant Employees January 16, 2013 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NEW YORK – The American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Civil Liberties Union filed a federal complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission today against UPS for unfairly forcing a pregnant package driver to take unpaid leave, refusing to accommodate her with light-duty work and forcing her to lose her company health insurance just before the birth of her child. The company has a policy of granting accommodations to other workers who are temporarily unable to perform all aspects of their job. This includes workers who are injured on the job, those covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act and those whose driver’s licenses are revoked due to drunk driving infractions. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended by the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, prohibits workplace discrimination based on pregnancy and requires employers to treat pregnant workers the same as others who are similar in their ability to work. “I was ready and willing to keep working throughout my pregnancy to provide for my family,” said Julie Desantis-Mayer, who has been with UPS for 10 years and works as a full-time package driver. “I would have been treated better had I lost my license. I’m a good worker who just wanted to take care of myself and my child. Instead I lost my income and my health insurance.” Desantis-Mayer routinely lifts packages up to 70 pounds without assistance, working up to 14-hour days. She is the only female driver in her center at the Farmingville UPS facility in Long Island. When she told her supervisor in March 2012 that she was pregnant, she was asked if she expected “special treatment.” In April, when she was eight weeks pregnant, Desantis-Mayer’s doctor recommended that she lift no more than 25 pounds for the duration of her pregnancy. Desantis-Mayer offered to do light duty at a desk job or delivering air packages, which were lighter than those on her usual route. She had been accommodated like this before when she pulled a muscle on the job. Instead, she was told this was different and was forced to take unpaid leave. “By denying pregnant workers the same accommodations as other workers who are temporarily unable to deliver packages, UPS leaves women workers who start families out in the cold,” said Ariela Migdal, senior staff attorney with the ACLU Women’s Rights Project. “Thirty-five years after Congress passed the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, pregnant workers are still being pushed out of the workplace, despite their willingness and desire to stay on the job.” In his annual State of the State address last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called on state legislators to enact a series of initiatives to promote women’s equality and close loopholes in protections for women. “Employers cannot continue to unfairly single out pregnant women for unequal treatment,” NYCLU Staff Attorney Mariko Hirose said. “This complaint illustrates just one of the many difficulties facing women that Governor Cuomo has sought to address in his vigorous legislative agenda for women’s equality.” For more information about this case, please visit: www.aclu.org/womens-rights/ups-and-pregnancy-discrimination
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org
All posts by George
How about a mental health evaluation too??
UPS crash exposes dangers of efficiency obsession
A near fatal United Parcel Service accident in Federal Way has raised new questions about the safety of some of those iconic brown trucks that line neighborhood streets nationwide. What’s more, the drivers detail that “cars that don’t start still move/drive down road even when the parking brake is on” and finally that the “clutch safety system (is) disabled – allowing cars to start in gear without (a) depressed clutch”. KIRO 7 also obtained cell phone video of a local UPS deliveryman. In the video, the driver stands on the passenger side and demonstrates he can start the truck without being in his seat to push in the clutch and brake. “Is this just the tip of the iceberg, a single accident? Or is this something more systemic?” asked Haukaas’s Seattle-based attorney David Beninger.
UPS is converting its truck fleet to operate without traditional keys.
Most UPS drivers now hit a remote fob then tap a button on the dash twice to start their vehicles. The company estimates the change saves millions of dollars in time efficiency a year; however, a former deliveryman believes glitches in the system are putting both drivers and the public in danger.
Mark Haukaas is still recovering after he was nearly killed last year delivering packages in Federal Way.
Haukaas was working part-time around the holidays to supplement his income as a pastor. He had just finished dropping off a box when the truck he was riding in failed to start. “All of a sudden we were rushing down a hill with great speed,” Haukaas recalled. With the engine quiet, a series of mechanical problems ensued and both the power brakes and steering faded. “I recall myself praying,” Haukaas told KIRO 7 investigative reporter, Chris Halsne during an exclusive interview.
Though the parking brake was engaged, it was no match for the heavy truck’s momentum on a steep neighborhood hill. The vehicle quickly careened out of control.
“My next memory is smashing into something,” Haukaas said. “I was in great pain; I knew something horrible had happened. Nine months later, Haukaas is learning to live with a fused spine, blind left eye and constant pain in his disabled hand, shoulder and leg. When KIRO 7 asked UPS to explain the accident and whether the new, retrofitted keyless ignition system might have played a factor, we received an email that stated, in part, “All mechanical and electrical functions of the package car were found to be in good working order.”
Yet, Haukaas and police dispute that statement. Federal Way police said their job was to investigate whether a crime had taken place. Officers determined that the truck driver was not at fault for the crash; however, police said the investigation into mechanical and electrical functions of the vehicle was inconclusive.
Haukaas insists that a piercing alarm began sounding off inside the truck hours before the crash.
“The alarm of some sort went off in the cab. It was very loud; I didn’t know what it signified, not sure the driver knew either,” Haukaas said. “It was very annoying and then later his supervisor came and spoke with him. I was kind of left in the dark but we were given earplugs which we used at times to try to gut it out and deliver the packages.” Accident scene photos clearly show a brightly colored foam earplug in Haukaas’s ear.
When KIRO 7 asked for a complete set of Federal Way police investigative files, UPS sought, then was granted (without our knowledge or participation in the legal process) an injunction to block release of certain crash-related documents. Once we found out, KIRO 7 challenged that ruling and a King County Superior Court judge sided with us; ruling nearly all of the documents relating to the case were public records. Those documents confirm the driver described the alarm to his UPS supervisor as “deafening” about five hours prior to the crash and that a supervisor was sent to Haukaas and the driver after two complaints into UPS’s local headquarters in Pacific.
Eric Gillett is an attorney hired by UPS in an effort to stop the full police file from being released. We asked Gillett about the alarm and earplugs. “I can’t speak to that…” Gillett said. “I’m not familiar with that investigation.”
Meanwhile, UPS might have a bigger problem than a mechanical malfunction with just one smashed truck.
Drivers tell KIRO 7 the new keyless ignition system has plenty of quirks—issues that make them feel unsafe. Teamsters Local 174 listed some of the safety issues in this never before released letter to Labor and Industries. The letter dated December 20, 2011 notes, among other things, that “cars lurch and move forward significantly when starting” and if the “engine shuts off while driving there is no power to brake system.”
Haukaas has retained Beninger and the Luvera Law Firm for a potential lawsuit against UPS. Beninger believes ferretting out potential mechanical safety issues with the entire UPS fleet is just part of taking care of his client. “The more we look, the more we seem to find. The bigger the concerns and the larger the flag is,” said Beninger. “This isn’t just and isolated problem but something much bigger.”
So far, UPS appears to be downplaying drivers’ fears.
An internal safety complaint obtained by KIRO 7Investigators seems to reflect that. The safety complaint was turned in three months prior to the crash that disabled Haukaas. In the document, a driver wrote that the “keyless system will allow car to start without clutch being engaged.” A UPS mechanic responded with, “Yes almost every vehicle that has a clutch has this problem. Vehicle OK to operate.”
Haukuss tells Halsne, he hopes his accident forces UPS to do a better job factoring in how new, money-saving efficiencies might affect both employee and public safety. “The individual worker is expendable,” Haukaas said. And by sharing his story, he hopes “it will help prevent this kind of horrible accident from recurring in some form or fashion in the future” and “empower certain ones to come out of the shadows to speak the truth.”
The Department of Labor and Industries won’t release its investigative files to KIRO 7 regarding the Teamsters complaint of the new keyless ignition system, but we do know this: UPS was not cited for any safety violations. Meanwhile, last year in New York, the attorney general’s office received a $1.3 million settlement against UPS over safety concerns.
Investigators found in 2004 and 2005 that more than 120 trucks were in use even though a supervisor identified “cracked” and “rotted” frames. In a press release, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said, “UPS knowingly endangered not only the lives of their own employees but the lives of the driving public. By keeping these rotting and decaying trucks on the roadways, UPS was an accident waiting to happen…”
Aside from the million dollar fee for penalties, fines and costs related to the investigation, UPS is currently required to have all their trucks in New York independently inspected.
By KIRO 7 Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne
Say it isn’t so
Fun in the Colorado sun
Fewer than 20% of workers have some sort of pension retirement plan
The days of guaranteed retirement benefit in the form of a pension are long gone. As numbers out of the Bureau of Labor Statistics show – defined benefit retirement pension are on a drastic decline since 1981. That was the year when over 80% of full-time workers in the private sector participated in a pension plan. By 1997, that number had plummeted to just over 50%. And by 2011, looking at all workers in all private businesses in America, fewer than 20% of workers have some sort of pension retirement plan. This translates into economic insecurity for seniors – especially now that Republicans in the House are trying to turn Social Security and Medicare over to private sector profiteers. This also adds to the growing list of things that Corporate America is taking from their workers, in its quest for higher and higher profits. In recent months – we’ve seen employers promise to reduce hours to avoid providing health insurance, we’ve seen the right to free political speech taken away, guaranteed vacation time and maternity leave don’t exist – workplace safety laws are getting watered down – heck, they’ve even taken our money by flattening our wages during a time of increased productivity. In some states, they even want to take away our bathroom breaks! This is nothing short of theft. And pretty soon, we’ll be handing over the shirts on our backs, just so that our bosses can squeeze whatever profits they can out of them.
Thom Hartmann
Van Gogh……van stop
You need to know this
So-called Free Trade is destroying our national manufacturing base. According to a new report by the National Bureau of Economic Research, free trade relations with China, beginning in 2000, are responsible for cutting 30% of the manufacturing jobs we have in this nation. You can see this decline in the raw numbers. Around 2001, there were 17 million manufacturing jobs in America. Today – that’s dropped off drastically to 11.5 million. And according to the Economic Policy Institute – nearly 3 million of those lost manufacturing jobs went directly to China since 2001. Thanks to so-called Free Trade, our policymakers are exporting those crucial blue-collar jobs that sustained a prosperous middle class, from the end of World War 2 all the way until the 1980’s. And without those jobs, Americans are forced into the minimum wage service sector, asking, “Would you like Fries with that?” or greeting people at the door saying, “Welcome to Wal-Mart.” This is exactly what the transnational billionaires who push for these trade agreements want. And until we drop out of these so-called free trade agreements, and once again begin protecting domestic manufacturing with tariffs or VAT taxes – the middle class will continue to shrink – and America will look more and more like a collapsed nation that’s exported all of its wealth to the rest of the world.
Thom Hartmann
The Soul of America
Despite such terminology as “fiscal cliff” and “debt ceiling,” the great debate taking place in Washington now has relatively little to do with financial issues. It is all about ideology. It is all about economic winners and losers in American society. It is all about the power of Big Money. It is all about the soul of America.
In America today, we have the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any major country on earth, and more inequality than at any time period since 1928. The top 1 percent owns 42 percent of the financial wealth of the nation, while, incredibly, the bottom 60 percent own only 2.3 percent. One family, the Walton family of Wal-Mart, owns more wealth than the bottom 40 percent of Americans. In terms of income distribution in 2010, the last study done on this issue, the top 1 percent earned 93 percent of all new income while the bottom 99 percent shared the remaining 7 percent.
Read on………………
People of Faith Should Back Strong Gun Violence Prevention Measures
The White House is considering proposals to reduce gun violence that go far beyond “simply reinstating an expired ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition,” according to the Washington Post. People of faith should back these efforts and work with President Obama to make our neighborhoods, schools, malls, streets and houses of worship safer. The proposals under consideration by a task force led by Vice President Biden would, according to the paper, “require universal background checks for firearm buyers, track the movement and sale of weapons through a national database, strengthen mental health checks, and stiffen penalties for carrying guns near schools or giving them to minors.” These are all positive steps. People of faith have long been advocates for sensible gun control measures that prevent violence and protect individual liberties. The National Council of Churches adopted a resolution in 2010 re-affirming the church’s long standing view on gun control, while acknowledging that not all Christians are of the same mind of this difficult issue that has pitted concepts of personal freedom against public safety. The resolution noted, in part: Christians are not alone in calling for measures to protect our society. The Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism has issued an action alert, which states: The national officers of the United Church of Christ were correct when they said after Sandy Hook: We need boldness from our leaders now. Too many Americans die each day, and so many of them are children. The evidence of our times must be changed, as William Sloane Coffin once argued, so that our reality changes. Even the most modest reform proposals will face push back from the NRA and their allies on Capitol Hill. Yet this is a campaign that can be won. In the end, I believe that the NRA will find out that the Rev. Canon Gary R. Hall, Dean of the National Cathedral, was correct when he said: “I believe the gun lobby is no match for the cross lobby.”
It is difficult to imagine that the One whose own Passion models the redemptive power of non-violence would look favorably on the violence of contemporary U.S. society. Present-day violence is made far worse than it otherwise would be by the prevalence of weapons on our streets.
And that many Christians believe it to be “idolatry to trust in guns to make us secure, since that usually leads to mutual escalation while distracting us from the One whose love alone gives us security.”
The recent tragedy in Newtown, CT is a tragic reminder that over 30,000 Americans die each year as a result of gun violence. The number and severity of violent shootings in recent years can only be described as an epidemic. We are inspired by a Jewish tradition that emphasizes the sanctity of human life, and commands us to turn weapons of destruction into tools for the greater good of society. It is imperative that President Obama and Congress take action to advance sensible gun control laws, including taking assault weapons off of our streets and improving our system of background checks.
No longer can we do nothing or simply do what seems possible.
As we grieve we are aware that this kind of tragedy happens over and over again in this country where for some the gun has become God. We must renew our efforts to control guns and thereby prevent violent tragedies such as this. We must learn how to place our trust in God, not in arms. We must turn swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks.