Fired Black worker didn’t fit boss’s ‘vision,’ feds say. Now Florida county will pay
A Black woman in Florida was fired from the county tourism office without reason and replaced with a white person, according to Justice Department officials.
Now the county is on the hook for $150,000.
Brevard County agreed to settle claims it violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 when Deidre Jackson was reportedly fired without cause in 2015 at the same time another minority employee was forced to resign, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a news release Tuesday.
“No one should suffer the indignity of losing her job because of the color of her skin,” Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division Eric S. Dreiband said in the release.
Under the terms of the settlement agreement, Brevard County has not admitted fault but will pay Jackson $100,000 in back pay and $50,000 in compensatory damages, according to court filings. The county also agreed to give supervisors and managers mandatory anti-discrimination training in accordance with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
The federal government sued Brevard County after Jackson filed a claim for discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which referred the case to the Justice Department, officials said.
The Florida Space Coast Office of Tourism helps to promote Brevard County, located on Florida’s east coast, as a tourist destination. Jackson worked for the office from 2007 until she was fired in 2015, according to court filings.
“During her eight-year tenure as a county employee in the tourism office, Jackson had an exemplary work record,” the federal complaint states.
Officials said a new manager, a white man named Eric Garvey, was hired in 2014.
According to court filings, Garvey did not communicate any issues with Jackson’s work and “noticeably avoided interacting with her during the work day.” He reportedly met with her two times in six months — once to introduce himself and then again to discuss specific job duties.
He fired Jackson six months after his arrival in April 2015 without advance notice, according to the complaint.
“Garvey told Jackson that she did not fit what his vision of what he wanted the office to look like and there was no place for her in the office,” the complaint states. “Garvey also told Jackson that he wanted her gone in 14 days. When Jackson asked Garvey if there was anything wrong with her job performance, Garvey answered ‘no.’ ”
Around the same time, officials said another employee who had worked at the office for 25 years without any issues was told she would be fired if she didn’t resign.
The employee was Asian-American, according to the complaint.
Justice Department officials said both women were replaced with white employees, resulting in “an all-white tourism office.” Garvey left the office in 2018, the Travel Pulse reported.
This story was originally published July 28, 2020 at 7:04 PM.
