Illegal activities of Southern Bosses for the week ending on Friday, November 25
Papa John’s Pizza will pay $175,000 and provide other relief to settle a disability discrimination lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency announced last week.
According to the EEOC’s suit, in early 2020, Michael Barnes applied for a job at his local Papa John’s restaurant in Athens, Georgia, after hearing from a friend that the company hired individuals with vision impairments. Barnes, who is legally blind and relies on his service dog for his commute, reached out to the local store manager and applied for a job. Barnes was hired but could not start until his accommodation request to bring his service dog was formally granted by Papa John’s. Papa John’s denied Barnes’s accommodation request and fired him before he worked a single shift.
Such conduct violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The EEOC filed suit in U.S. District Court after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement via its conciliation process.
Under the two-year consent decree resolving the lawsuit, Papa John’s will pay $175,000 in monetary damages to Barnes; train its employees on the ADA; review its employment policies; and allow the EEOC to monitor complaints of discrimination or retaliation.
“Not allowing blind and visually impaired people to travel to and from work in the way that affords them confidence and independence is akin to telling sighted workers who rely on the flexibility and independence of driving that they may not travel to work by car,” said Karla Gilbride, the EEOC’s general counsel.
A U.S. Department of Labor investigation has recovered $139,975 in back wages from a Spartanburg, NC home healthcare provider that wrongly exempted 29 employees from overtime and failed to pay them proper wages in violation of federal regulations.
The department’s Wage and Hour Division investigators found Apella Health Management, operating as Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System, listed some occupational therapy and physical therapy assistants as overtime exempt and paid them on a per-visit rate when, in fact, they did not meet the duties test for learned professionals. By doing so, the employer violated the Fair Labor Standards Act by not paying the additional half-time rate for hours over 40 in a workweek. Apella Health also failed to maintain records of hours worked by the affected workers.
“To use the ‘learned professional employee’ overtime exemption, employers must meet several criteria and cannot apply the criteria randomly,” said Wage and Hour Division District Director Jamie Benefiel in Columbia, South Carolina. “The Department of Labor is determined to protect the rights of the nation’s care workers, people who provide vital services to those in need and who deserve to be paid all of their legal wages and benefits in return for their hard work.”
A global manufacturer of industrial gas could have prevented a May 2023 explosion in High Springs, Florida that severely injured several employees by following required operating procedures in the manufacturing process, a U.S. Department of Labor investigation has found.
After the explosion at Air Liquide Advanced Materials Inc., investigators with the department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration initiated an inspection at the manufacturer site, where diborane — a toxic, colorless and pyrophoric gas — is produced, distilled, mixed and transferred.
OSHA determined the explosion occurred as a 25-year-old product technician used a heat gun to transfer gas from an aluminum source cylinder to a steel cylinder. The blast propelled the worker through the building’s wall, causing severe injuries. They were flown to UF Shands Hospital’s trauma center and treated for brain injuries, third-degree burns and a leg amputation. Four other workers suffered various injuries and were treated at the hospital. In addition, first responders aiding in the employees’ rescue suffered chemical burns to their hands and necks and were taken to the UF Shands Hospital Burn Center.
After its investigation, OSHA cited Air Liquide Advanced Materials for willfully exposing workers to fire and explosion hazards by requiring them to use equipment not intrinsically safe in the presence of flammable chemicals and vapors. The agency also cited the employer for 12 serious violations for the following failures:
Not removing equipment in hazardous locations with ignitable or combustible properties of specific gases, vapors, dust or fibers present.
Not classifying buildings as process safety management sites properly and documenting that equipment complied with recognized good engineering practices.
OSHA proposed $201,573 in penalties to address the safety violations found in the investigation.
The company has 15 business days from receipt of the citations and penalties to comply, request an informal conference with OSHA, or contest the findings before the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.
The City of Livingston, KY was under an evacuation order for most of Thanksgiving as a result of a derailed CSX freight train carrying sulfur that was breached, resulting in a chemical fire and a coating of the county in a mixture of sulfur dioxide and smoke from the fire. Residents said you “couldn’t see three feet in front of your face.”
The U.S. Department of Labor assessed two North Carolina employers – McClenny Farms and Francisco Valadez – $139,039 in penalties after its investigation found they victimized non-immigrant farmworkers by shortchanging 65 workers’ wages, and by trying to intimidate and seizing their passports. In addition to those penalties, the agency recovered $97,100 in stolen wages from not meeting the federal minimum wage and from denying payment for the workers first week on the job.
The U.S. Department of Justice filed a complaint on behalf of EPA against Chameleon LLC and Gary V. Layne to address violations of the Clean Water Act (CWA) involving unauthorized discharges of dredged or fill material into wetlands adjacent to tributaries of the Chickahominy and Pamunkey Rivers in Ashland, Virginia.
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