Alabama Nursing Home Settles Employment Discrimination Case after Firing a Woman for Being Transgender

MONTGOMERY, Ala. - September 10, 2015 – Summerford Nursing Home Inc. has agreed to pay an undisclosed financial settlement and implement a workplace nondiscrimination policy prohibiting sexual orientation and gender discrimination after firing a woman for being transgender, the Southern Poverty Law Center announced today.

Jessi Dye, 28, of Vinemont, Ala. was hired last fall by Summerford, a privately held nursing home company with 200 employees based in Falkville, Ala. She was fired from her position the first day on the job in November 2014 after company officials discovered she was transgender. The SPLC filed a discrimination complaint on Dye's behalf with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in March 2015.

According to the original complaint, a senior management official called Dye to his office on her first day at work on November 26 after a half day of new employee training. He questioned her about her sex, gender identity and physical anatomy, according to the complaint.

"What are you?" the management official asked. When Dye replied that she was a transgender woman, he asked how she expected to work with residents when she "looked one way" and was "another way" on paper. She was told she was being terminated effective immediately and to leave the facility. Dye asked if she was being let go for being transgender, and the senior official confirmed that was the case, the complaint said.

The nursing home will implement its new nondiscrimination policy immediately. Human resource personnel and the official who terminated Dye will attend LGBT training provided by the SPLC. As part of the settlement, reached in July, the EEOC claim is resolved and the business does not admit to violating any law.

"I was looking forward to my new position and heartbroken when I was fired because of my gender and not my qualifications for the job," Dye said. "No one should be discriminated against and kept from employment because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. I hope by taking a stand about what happened to me, it will help others in the LGBT community realize they have a right to equal treatment."

The case may be the first successful resolution of a transgender employment claim against a private employer in Alabama. The EEOC ruled in favor of a transgender Army employee based in Huntsville earlier this year. The resolution comes at a time of increased national attention to issues involving workplace equality.

In July, the EEOC ruled that employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is prohibited by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That ruling built on a 2012 EEOC decision establishing that Title VII prohibits employment discrimination because a person is transgender.

"The nursing home has done the right thing by resolving this case short of federal litigation," said Sam Wolfe, SPLC staff attorney. "Good jobs are hard to come by in Alabama, and no one should lose her job simply because she is transgender or because of some other aspect of who she is that has no bearing on job performance."

In April, the SPLC and co-counsel filed a federal lawsuit against a Louisiana company for unlawfully firing a transgender man. That suit is ongoing.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, based in Alabama with offices in Georgia, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi, is a nonprofit civil rights organization dedicated to fighting hate and bigotry, and to seeking justice for the most vulnerable members of society. For more information, see www.splcenter.org.