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JOCELYN
D. LARKIN (SBN 110817) THE
IMPACT FUND 125
University Avenue Berkeley,
CA 94710 Telephone: (510)
845-3473 Facsimile: (510) 845-3654 |
JOSEPH
SELLERS CHRISTINE
WEBBER CHARLES
TOMPKINS JULIE
GOLDSMITH COHEN,
MILSTEIN, HAUSFELD & TOLL West
Tower – Suite 500 1100
New York Avenue Washington,
D.C. 20005-3964 Telephone: (202) 408-4600 Facsimile: (202) 408-4699 |
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IRMA
D. HERRERA (SBN 98658) DEBRA
A. SMITH (SBN 147863) EQUAL
RIGHTS ADVOCATES 1663
Mission Street, Suite 250 San
Francisco, CA 94103 Telephone: (415)
621-0672 Facsimile: (415) 621-6744 |
STEPHEN
TINKLER MERIT
BENNETT TINKLER
& BENNETT 309
Johnson Street Santa
Fe, New Mexico 87501 Telephone: (505) 986-0269 Facsimile: (505) 982-6698 |
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SHEILA
Y. THOMAS (SBN 161403) EQUAL
RIGHTS ADVOCATES 5260
Proctor Avenue Oakland,
CA 94618 Telephone: (510) 339-3739 Facsimile: (510) 339-3723 |
DEBRA
GARDNER PUBLIC
JUSTICE CENTER 500
East Lexington Street Baltimore,
MD 21202 Telephone: (410) 625-9409 Facsimile: (410) 625-9423 |
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STEVE
STEMERMAN (SBN 067690) ELIZABETH
LAWRENCE (SBN 111781) DAVIS,
COWELL & BOWE 100
Van Ness Avenue, 20th Floor San
Francisco, CA 94102 Telephone: (415)
626-1880 Facsimile: (415) 626-2860 Attorneys for Plaintiffs |
SHAUNA
MARSHALL (SBN 90641) HASTINGS
COLLEGE OF THE LAW 200
McAllister Street San Francisco, CA 94102 Telephone: (415)
565-4685 Facsimile: (415) 565-4854 |
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
I, SUE RAMIREZ, declare:
1.
I make this declaration on the basis of my personal
knowledge, and, if called as a witness, could and would testify competently to
the facts herein.
2.
I was employed by Wal-Mart, Inc. from August 1989
until September 2001. I am female. While I was employed by Wal-Mart, I was known
as Sue McFarland.
3.
I began my career at Wal-Mart as a Customer Service
Manager in the Wagner, Oklahoma. I moved on to be a District Assistant where I
worked in approximately fifty stores. I
was then a District Manager in the Shoes and Jewelry Specialty Division over
seven stores. I spent my last three years with the Company as a Co-Manager at a
Supercenter in El Paso, Texas. I was
never disciplined at any time during my employment with Wal-Mart and my performance
evaluations were always at least “above average,” “exceeds expectations,” or
“outstanding.” I was never offered a
Store Manager position.
4.
I first applied to Wal-Mart after Store Manager Joe
Swenson recruited me to apply for the Customer Service Manager (CSM) position
at Store No. 63 in Wagner, Oklahoma. At
that time, I had been the Store Manager of Arrow Printshop for five years and I
believed Wal-Mart would offer me greater opportunities for advancement. In my initial interview with Personnel Manager
Amy Prime, I expressed interest in a management career even though I knew I was
applying for the CSM position. Ms. Prime
did not provide me with any information about Wal-Mart’s Management Training
Program or how to apply for management opportunities. Instead I learned from Ms. Prime, and others
after I started working, that you advanced at Wal-Mart by working your way up
the ladder.
5.
I tried to do that at the Wagner store. However, there was no formal posting or
application system for moving to positions within the store or seeking a
promotion. Instead, I learned about open
positions by observing, or hearing from co-workers, that certain employees were
quitting or being fired, transferred or promoted. After about a year as CSM, I became the UPC
Clerk simply by asking male Store Manager Gary Dickens for the position when I
learned it was vacant. I was “tapped on
the shoulder” to be the UPC Assistant about a year later by the new male Store
Manager, Mike Altemueller, when the current UPC Assistant left the position.
Mr. Altemueller just asked me if I wanted the position and I said yes. I remained in this position for about
eighteen months when I learned that a new district was being created and that
the new District Manager was going to be housed in the Wagner store. I asked the current male Store Manager, Greg
Epps, if he would recommend me to the District Manager to be the new District
Assistant. The new District Manager,
Carl Simpson, interviewed me and gave me the position. The job was not posted and I did not apply
for it other than asking my Store Manager to tell the District Manager that I
was interested in it.
6.
I was interested in getting a job at the District
level because I believed it would offer me more advancement opportunities than
the Wagner store had. After more than four years of employment at the store
level, my pay rate had only increased from $5.25 to $7.70 per hour despite my
good performance evaluations, various promotions, and merit raises. Moreover, I had observed that each of the
jobs in the front end where I worked was comprised almost exclusively of
women. I had also observed that the
Store Manager had changed four times and each time a man had been transferred
into the position. Finally, none of the
Store Managers or Assistant Managers was mentoring me or in any way developing
me for management opportunities.
7.
I was promoted to District Assistant in November
1993. This is an hourly position and my
pay had to be increased twice to bring me up to the Company pay guideline of
$8.80 an hour. My job duties included budgeting, doing audits in the individual
stores’ offices, and assisting the District Manager in the operational end of
his work with the stores in his district.
8.
Mr. Simpson’s district initially included about seven
stores. However, the district was constantly changing as Wal-Mart
expanded. My job duties required me to
visit all the stores in the district on a regular basis. This required extensive traveling. After about three years, Larry Wilcockson
replaced Carl Simpson as the District Manager. The district continued to change
and I was exposed to many different new stores.
During the five years I was District Assistant, I also worked with
District Managers Buddy Caldwell and David Carmen and had an opportunity to
visit the stores in their district as well.
I believe that I worked in over fifty stores while holding the position
of District Assistant. I observed that
each of the stores under District Managers Simpson, Wilcockson, Caldwell and
Carmen operated similarly and followed the same policies and practices that I
had learned as an associate in the Wagner store.
9.
As District Assistant, I reviewed the daily, weekly
and monthly financial and personnel reports that the Home Office prepared for
each of the stores in my district. These
reports were available to me from the Company-wide computer system that linked
each store to corporate headquarters.
The District Manager would review these reports with each Store Manager
in the district on a regular basis, either through an individual telephone call
or store visit, or through weekly conference calls with all the Store Managers
in the district, or during district-wide meetings held at various stores. I frequently attended these meetings and
participated in the conference calls.
10.
I observed that my own job was gender-segregated. I did not meet any male District Assistants
during the five years I was a District Assistant and I did not met any after I
left that position. I also observed that
men holding jobs with much less responsibility, such as grocery stocker or a
grocery department manager, were paid more than I was. Despite an outstanding evaluation my last
year as a District Assistant, my hourly rate was still only $11.50 an hour in
1996, seven years after I began my career at Wal-Mart. I wrote on my 1996 evaluation, as I had
written on earlier evaluations, that I was interested in advancing in the
Company: “Enjoy my job, working with
Larry and each of the stores. Would like to continue to learn operations and
more merchandising skills. Want to
understand all company functions.
Definitely want to grow with Company.”
(Attached hereto as Ramirez Exhibit A is a true and accurate copy of my
1996 annual performance evaluation.)
11.
In May 1997, I talked with District Manager Wilcockson
about my future with the Company. He
told me that the only way to get promoted would be to become a salaried member
of management. By now I was very well
qualified for a management position and eager to move up. My ultimate goal was
to become a Regional Personnel Manager.
Mr. Wilcockson was supportive and several days later the male Regional
Personnel Manager, Rod Thurston, called me.
We discussed the job responsibilities of an assistant manager and he
asked me to take a drug test. As soon as
the results were in, Mr. Thurston told me that I was being promoted to
Assistant Manager at Store No. 41 in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. The position was not posted and I did not
apply for it. I was paid an annual
salary of approximately $29,500.
However, I was told not to transfer to the Bartlesville store until I
had finished opening up several new Supercenters in my district and assisting
the Regional Loss Prevention team with high shrink issues. I was also instructed to begin reporting to male
Store Manager Rick Rubiken in the Bartlesville store and to complete the
Assistant Manager Training Program through Wal-Mart’s computer-based learning
system.
12.
Several months later, before I ever transferred to the
Bartlesville store as an Assistant Manager, the Regional Manager for the
Jewelry and Shoes Specialty Division, Cindy Marsh, visited the District Office
looking for Assistant Managers interested in going into the Specialty Division
Management Training Program. I started
talking to her about it and indicated that I was interested in that
opportunity. I was next interviewed by
the Divisional Manager for the Jewelry and Shoes Specialty Division, Jim Wake,
and accepted into the program. I was
sent to train with a female District Manager, Jody McAnnally, in the Tulsa
area.
13.
I completed the
Jewelry and Shoes Specialty Division District Manager Training Program in October 1997. I was promoted to
District Manager in the St. Louis, Missouri area after Divisional Manager Wake
called me about the opening. I went to
corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas for further interviews. Mr.
Wake informed me that I was being promoted.
My salary only increased to approximately $32,000. I was required to relocate my home to St.
Louis, Missouri to begin training. As District Manager in the Jewelry and Shoes
Specialty Division, my duties included ensuring that the seven stores in my
district were operationally correct regarding the inventory and staffing of the
Jewelry and Shoe Departments, and controlling shrink in these departments due
to theft. I held this position for about
ten months. My direct supervisor was the
Regional Manager over the Jewelry and Shoes Specialty Division. At first this was Ional Duval. Later, the position was filled by a male,
Lenny Fulcher. The Regional Manager
reported to the Divisional Manager, Greg Wake.
This is the same reporting structure used by the main Wal-Mart stores.
14.
During the time I was a District Manager in the
Specialty Division, I observed that the Jewelry and Shoe Departments in each of
my stores operated similarly and followed the same policies and practices as
the other departments in the Wal-Mart store even though they were technically
in the Specialty Division. Thus, I used the same Company guidelines and forms
for hiring, evaluating, promoting, disciplining and terminating employees in
the Specialty Division as had the District Managers I worked for when I was a
District Assistant. I also attended the
same Company-wide year-end and holiday meetings in Bentonville that the
non-Specialty Division managers attended.
15.
As a District Manager in the Specialty Division, I had
available to me the same daily, weekly and monthly reports from corporate
headquarters regarding the financial and personnel operations of the Jewelry
and Shoe Departments in each of my stores as I had used when I was a District
Assistant. I would review these reports
with the Jewelry and Shoe Department Managers in my stores on a regular basis
through telephone calls, store visits, or district-wide meetings held at
various stores.
16.
After about six
months in the District Manager position, I decided that I wanted to return to
the main Wal-Mart division because it had become clear to me that the Specialty
Division was also segregated by gender and that my current position was not
such a good stepping stone for achieving my goal of Regional Personnel
Manager. In particular, I observed at
the district level that women were assigned almost exclusively to the Jewelry
and Shoes Division while men were most often assigned to the Tire Lube Express
Division, the Pharmacy, and the Photo Lab.
17.
I called the Regional Personnel Manager who had
promoted me to Assistant Manager, Rod Thurston, and told him that I was
interested a co-manager position. I was
really worried that the District Manager position in Jewelry and Shoes would be
a dead end for my career. Mr. Thurston
and I discussed the responsibilities of the co-manager position, base pay, and
the fact that I would need to relocate to another store. About four months later, Mr. Thurston
informed me that I could begin co-manager training at Store No. 271 in Eureka,
Missouri.
18.
I transferred to the Eureka store and trained for
approximately three months under male Store Manager Bud Gardner. In approximately November 1998, Regional
Personnel Manager Thurston called me about an open co-manager position at Store
No. 2612 in El Paso, Texas. We discussed whether El Paso would be a good place
for me and my daughter and the moving arrangements. I told him that I was interested in the
position so long as I did not have to relocate again until after my daughter
graduated from high school, which would be in May 2000, about eighteen months
away. I was recently divorced and very much
wanted a stable environment for my daughter.
19.
Mr. Thurston
called me back a day or two later and told me that I definitely had the job in
El Paso. This job was not posted and I
did not apply for it. I did not
interview with anyone else besides Mr. Thurston. However, I would not have accepted
the El Paso position if I had not understood from Mr. Thurston that the
District Director in El Paso had agreed that I would not need to relocate until
after my daughter graduated.
20.
In approximately January 1999, after I had been
working as a Co-Manager for approximately five months, Store Manager Lorenzo
Nava told me that District Manager Rick Klein had told him that I was
promotable and that I should start looking for a Store Manager position. I started looking for an open Store Manager
position at this time but I also reminded Store Manager Nava and District
Manager Klein that I could not look outside the El Paso area.
21.
Over the next eighteen months, at least five Store
Manager positions became available in the El Paso area in Stores Nos. 512, 500,
964, 1015, and 2612. Three of these positions were not posted and one was
posted for a mere 24 hours before it was filled. I was not allowed to apply and/or was not
considered for any of these positions, as detailed below.
22.
In the fall of 1999, I learned through the grapevine
that the current male Store Manager of Store No. 512, Rick Espino, was leaving.
I wanted to apply for the job but it was not posted on Wal-Mart’s Management
Career Services computerized program. I
called District Manager Klein to let him know that I was interested in the
position but he was not in so I left a message with his Assistant that I needed
to speak with him. I also expressed my
interest in the position to my Store Manager, Lorenzo Nava. Mr. Nava told me that Wal-Mart was filling
the position with a male Co-Manager from Houston, David Watts. District Manager Klein never returned my
phone call and shortly after my conversation with my Store Manager, David Watts
did, in fact, become the Store Manager in Store No. 512.
23.
During this same time period, I also learned through
the grapevine that Store No. 500 was losing its current Store Manager. Again, the job was not posted on the Wal-Mart
computer so I called District Manager Klein to let him know I was
interested. He was not available but I
left a message with his Assistant requesting him to call me. I never received a call from Mr. Klein and
later learned that Rick Espino, the former Store Manager at Store No. 512, had
transferred there.
24.
Some time later
but before my daughter graduated, another male Store Manager, James Zepeda,
left Store No. 964. As before, I wanted
to apply for this position but it was not posted on Wal-Mart’s computer. I called District Manager Klein to apply for
the job but he was again unavailable and never returned my call. I learned later that another male, Jose
(“Harvey”) Ayala, got the job.
25.
I was extremely upset that District Manager Klein had
not advised me of, allowed me to apply for, or interviewed me for any of the
positions discussed above so I decided to use Wal-Mart’s “open door” policy to
discuss my concerns with the Regional Personnel Manager Tom Gallegos. I met with Mr. Gallegos privately during a
company-wide meeting in Bentonville and informed him that I thought I had not
been treated fairly when I was not interviewed for these three positions, that
I was aware of an upcoming opening for a Store Manager in the El Paso area at
Store No. 1015, and that I would like an opportunity to apply for it. I understood from his response that I should
go ahead and apply and that I would be considered. However, the very next day, District Manager
Klein approached me and told me that he knew I had been petitioning for a store
and that he did not appreciate it. I
understood from this that District Manager Klein did not want me to apply for
the position and that if I did, I would not be considered.
26.
Unlike the
prior Store Manager openings described above, the vacancy at Store No. 1015 was
posted on the computer. However, the
notice advised only current store managers to apply and it remained on the
computer for only one day. Although I
had expressed my interest in this position to Regional Personnel Manager
Gallegos, I did not apply on the computer because I was not a store
manager. Later I learned that a female
Co-Manager, Liz Gonzalez, had been promoted to this position.
27.
The day after I returned from a vacation after my
daughter’s graduation, District Manager Klein told me that I needed to apply
for stores outside the El Paso area or step down from my position as
Co-Manager. Although I was applying to
stores outside of El Paso, I told District Manager Klein that I still preferred
to remain in the El Paso area as I had made a new life in El Paso. I did not feel my request to remain in El
Paso was unreasonable given that I had already relocated on numerous occasions
for the Company and the El Paso area was a growing market for Wal-Mart. Also, I did not observe District Manager
Klein insisting that the male Co-Managers in his district leave El Paso or step
down. When I complained to my Store
Manager about how differently Mr. Klein was treating me, Mr. Nava responded
that it was to be expected since I was not part of the “good ‘ole boy” network. Later I learned from another female
Co-Manager in the district, Sheryl Sink, that District Manager Klein had told
her that she needed to find a store outside of El Paso or be demoted. Although
Ms. Sink had been working at different stores in the El Paso area since 1984
when she first joined Wal-Mart management, and although she was the primary
caretaker for her ailing mother, she was not promoted to a store manager
position until she relocated to Store No. 829 in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
28.
My daughter graduated in May 2000. Over the next year, I applied for store manager
positions in Kingsport, Tennessee; Tucson, Arizona; Hilo, Hawaii; Alamagordo,
New Mexico; Santa Fe, New Mexico; Las Vegas, Nevada; Sulphur Springs, Texas and
Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Although I was
interviewed over the phone for some of these positions, I was not selected for
any of them.
29.
Sometime in early summer 2001, I was recruited by
KMart to join their Company as a Store Manager in El Paso. I shared this
information with my Store Manager, Lorenzo Nava. Shortly thereafter, the new male Regional Personnel
Manager, Brian Cabal, and the Regional Vice President, David Carmen, called me
and asked me why I was considering going to another Company. I shared with them my frustration at the
limited opportunities I was experiencing in trying to achieve my goal of being
a Store Manager at Wal-Mart. They
assured me that, if I stayed with Wal-Mart, I would have an opportunity to
apply for the next store that opened in El Paso. I told them that I would trust their word and
stay. Relying on their representation that
I would be considered for a Store Manager position in the El Paso area, I
turned down the job with KMart.
30.
The next Store Manager position to open in El Paso was
at my own store, No. 2612, when Mr. Nava left his employment with
Wal-Mart. The job was posted and I
applied. Even though I was in charge of
the store during the weeks after Mr. Nava left, I was not even interviewed for
the position. It was given to another
male, Roy Mendoza.
31.
I called
Regional Personnel Manager Cabal to complain that I had been denied an
interview. I reminded him that I had
turned down an opportunity and that I hoped I had not made a grave
mistake. He responded that he hoped I
had not, too. Meanwhile, District
Manager Klein continued to pressure me to move out of his district or step
down. Several months later I left
Wal-Mart to take a Store Manager position at KMart because it was clear to me
that I was not going to be promoted to a Store Manager position in El Paso or
anywhere else in the country, much less reach my goal of becoming a Regional
Personnel Manager.
32.
After I left Wal-Mart, at least three male Co-Managers
in Mr. Klein’s district were allowed to remain in their stores as Co-Managers
and not demoted for failing to obtain a Store Manager position: Dale Schier, Willie Huerta, and Fernie
[LNU]. I believe District Manager Klein
denied me the position of a Store Manager in his district because I am a woman.
I declare under penalty of perjury of the laws of the United States and State of __________________ that the foregoing is true and correct.
This Declaration was signed by me on ______________________, 2003, at _______________________.
____________________________________
S:\SHARE\LEGAL\Walmart\Declarations\Sue McFarland Ramirez class cert declaration.doc