EEOC: Wash. Hotels Paying $370,000 to Settle Sexual Harassment Lawsuit

The owners of a Seattle-area hotel has agreed to pay $370,000 to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit filed by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that accused the owners of permitting a manager of harassing tow female housekeepers.

GIPHX10 LLC and Jaffer Inc., both Canadian companies based in Edmonton, entered into a consent decree that also requires them to retain an independent consultant to help them develop policies and procedures to recognize and prevent sexual harassment and retaliation, the EEOC said in a press release Wednesday.

The companies operated the Hawthorn Suites by Wyndham, located near the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in Kent, Washington.

TheEEOC said a maintenance manager at the hotel groped the women when they were alone cleaning hotel rooms, mocked them for objecting to the assaults, made sexually explicit comments and repeatedly threatened one worker with rape. One of the woman quit out of fear for her safety.

One of the housekeepers reported the harassment to the general manager with the help of a bilingual coworker. The owners failed to conduct a thorough investigation and accepted the manager’s denials, the EEOC said. The general manager then retaliated against the housekeeper by cutting her work hours and denying her an hourly raise given to other housekeepers.

The two women joined in the EEOC’s lawsuit and filed additional state law claims.

“We have seen the risk of workplace harassment increase when there is a large power difference, when the targeted employee can be isolated, and when employees have limited English proficiency, as noted in the EEOC’s Select Task Force on the Study of Harassment in the Workplace,” statedEEOC San Francisco District Director Nancy Sienko. “Employers should ensure that workers receive information regarding harassment policies in a manner and language they understand, which in this case would have been in Spanish.”

The EEOC said that it the consent decree also requires the hotel owners to implement companywide training, including investigation training for managers and owners with an active management role. The agency will monitor the workplace during the three-year period the consent decree remains in effect.