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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 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 |
|
SHEILA
Y. THOMAS (SBN 161403) 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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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 |
DEBRA
GARDNER PUBLIC
JUSTICE CENTER 500
East Lexington Street Baltimore,
MD 21202 Telephone: (410) 625-9409 Facsimile: (410) 625-9423 |
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SHAUNA
MARSHALL (SBN 90641) HASTINGS
COLLEGE OF THE LAW 200
McAllister Street San Francisco, CA 94102 Telephone: (415)
565-4685 Facsimile:
(415) 565-4854 Attorneys for Plaintiffs |
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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
I, Tamara Zumbrun, declare:
1. I am a
female employee at the Wal-Mart Store in Mountain Home, Idaho. I began working at Wal-Mart in July,
2000. When I applied for the Management
Training Program as a result of the January 2003 solicitation of applicants, I
was told that there were additional, previously undisclosed requirements that
barred me from qualification. I have
experienced sexual harassment and retaliation for using the Open Door at
Wal-Mart.
2. From the time I applied at Wal-Mart, I
was interested in becoming a part of Wal-Mart management. I wrote on my application that I was
interested in management positions. See
Tamara Zumbrun’s Application Supplement, a true and correct copy hereto
attached as Exhibit A. In addition, I
told Assistant Manager Eric Wright (male) during my first interview that I was
interested in a position as department manager and that I had interest in other
management positions. In my second
interview, I told Co-Manager Steve Payne (male) that I was interested in
management positions.
3. My first job at Wal-Mart was to help
with store setup, because the Mountain Home store had not yet opened. After setup was complete, I became an overnight
receiverstocker.
4. In October 2000, I received my 90-day performance
evaluation from Assistant Manager Skip Davis (male). I informed told
Mr. Davis during this evaluation that I wanted to join
management. See
Tamara Zumbrun’s October 5, 2000 90-day Evaluation, a true and correct copy
hereto attached as Exhibit B.
5. In January, 2001, I applied for a
position as team lead for ICS with the hope that the position would lead to an
opportunity to join the Management Training Program. Assistant Manager Skip Davis conducted the
interview. He asked several
gender-specific questions, including, "Being a female, what makes you more
qualified for this job than a male employee?" In addition, I was told by Skip Davis that
the ICS staff is mostly male and they might have a problem with a female
boss. For over an hour, Mr. Davis
required me to justify why he should give the promotion to a female instead of
a male. Then he a chose a male employee,
Tony Whitten, for the position.
6. In
February, 2001, I transferred to a cashier position. Co-Manager Steve Payne was my
supervisor. Mr. Payne did not address
female employees by their first names.
Instead, he referred to female employees, including me, as
"Babe," "Baby-Doll," or "Baby." In contrast, he addressed male employees by
their first names.
7. One night
when Mr. Payne referred to a female co-worker as "Babe," I told him
that his comment offended me. Mr. Payne
only rolled his eyes and walk away.
8. I tried
to use the Open Door to address my concerns of gender discrimination and sexual
harassment. I contacted Assistant
Manager Don Grist in September 2001, to again raise my concerns
about Mr. Payne’s sexual harassment and Mr. Davis’ gender-specific
questions. I told Mr. Grist that every
time Mr. Payne talks to a female employee, he calls her "Babe,"
"Baby-Doll," or "Baby."
Mr. Grist said that someday Mr. Payne would get in trouble for that, but
did nothing to address the problem. I am
unaware of any coaching or action taken as a result of my use of the Open
Door. Mr. Payne and a co-worker Fred
Hack (male) continued to call me and other females “Babe”. Because the Open Door failed me, I began to
look for an opportunity to move to another department.
9. Shortly
after speaking to Assistant Manager Don Grist, I began receiving different
treatment at Wal-Mart. I was disciplined
for minor violations for which male employees were not ordinarily
disciplined. On September 22, 2001 I
received a coaching for profanity when I used the word "damn" in the employee
break room. I routinely heard male
employees use far worse profanity in front of management and customers while
they were outside together on cigarette breaks.
In addition, I heard Tony Whitten call a female employee, Bobby Dimick a
"f***ing bitch,” and he did not receive a coaching. In fact, within months he was promoted to
department manager of ICS, the position for which I had applied and
interviewed. On October 31In
October, 2001, I
was given a "decision day," the most severe discipline at Wal-Mart
short of termination, for misjudging the timing of my paycheck deposit, which
resulted in one of my personal checks failing to clear at Wal-Mart. Don Kingsley, a male employee, bounced eight
checks before he was even coached, a less severe form of discipline. Another male, Kim Cummings, also bounced a
check at Wal-Mart but he was not given a decision day.
10. According
to Wal-Mart policy, as a result of the decision day I was ineligible for
promotion to any position for one year.
11. After I received my September coaching I
asked my Customer Service Manager (CSM),
Joyce FryeTammy Epley,
for a merit raise, and she said that it would be no probleme. However, Tammy
Epley, the other lead CSM Ms.
Epleylater told me said that it was not possible for
me to get a merit raise because I had an active written coaching in my
file.
12. In May 2002 I transferred from cashier
to the Photo Center as a lab technician. The lab
technician position is a higher paying position than cashier, but I had to
plead for a raise for months. It was not
given to me until September 2002.
132. The Photo Center was very short staffed
when I arrived, and so we all had to work very hard to keep up with the
workload. All of the Associates at the
Photo Lab were female, except for one. He was on a leave of absence. , and we joinedAnother
female employee, Christian Compton, and I joined together to ask
for a merit raise from our Co-Manager Jim Payne. Mr. Payne just laughed at us.
1413. In approximately
SeptemberOctober 2002, I
was promoted to lab specialist in the Photo Center. For this promotion, I was supposed to receive
a .25 cent raise, according to my Assistant Manager in the Photo Lab, Laura
Sauer. As of April 2003, I still have
not received the raise.
1514. In January 2003, there was a flyer placed by
the time clock in our store advertising the Management Training Program. According to the flyer, any employee could
apply for a position in the Management Training Program. The application period was for a limited
time, approximately one week or a little less.
In my two and one half years at Wal-Mart, I had never known of any
other opportunity to apply for the
Management Training Program. As I had
been interested in joining management from the commencement of my employment at
Wal-Mart, I applied. I completed the
application over the pipeline, Wal-Mart’s computerized information network
which has online applications for some job positions. I met all of the prerequisites for the
program.
1615. My Store Manager, Pat Cochran, interviewed
me for the position on March 6, 2003. He
told me that I was not ready to become a Management Trainee. He told me that I needed to spend some time
as a department manger and then as a Support Manager first. Mr. Cochran told me that I had another two
years of employment at Wal-Mart before I would be ready. Meanwhile, according to the pipeline
application, I had met all the requirements necessary to apply for the
position. I had not been asked on my
application about whether I had held positions as a department manager or
Support Manager.
1716. Mr. Cochran further elaborated and said that
I needed experience with the Telzon, Wal-Mart’s handheld inventory and pricing
computer, and that I needed experience with modular set-up, which is building
and displaying items on Wal-Mart display units.
I had experience in both of these areas.
I reminded Mr. Cochran that I used the Telzon everyday in the Photo
Center and reminded him that my first job at Wal-Mart was to set-up the
modulars. That did not change his
mind. He continued to tell me that it
would be another two years before I would be qualified for the Management
Training Program.
1817. Throughout my interview Mr. Cochran asked me
if I was willing to relocate to enter the Management Training Program. Every time he asked me, I told him yes, but
he continued to ask.
1918. Despite this discouragement from Store
Manager Cochran, I continue to be interested in joining the Management Training
Program at Wal-Mart. I have received no
information from Wal-Mart indicating if there will be another opportunity to
apply for the program. I have received
no encouragement from Store Manager Cochran, and he has not made any effort to
provide to me the experience he stated I needed before I could be trained to be
a Wal-Mart manager.
2019. As of March 2003 I am still working in the
photo lab at Wal-Mart. Of approximately
eight Assistant Mangers in our store, only two three
are female, Beth Frost and
Laura Drier. When the store
opened in the late summer of 2000, only one Assistant Manager in the store, out
of eight, was female.
I have
personal knowledge of each and every fact set forth in the Declaration, and if
called to testify as a witness in this matter, I could and would competently
testify to each of these facts.
I declare
under penalty of perjury of the laws of the United States and State of Idaho
that the foregoing is true and correct.
This
Declaration was signed by me on ______________________, 2003, in the City of
________________________________, State of Idaho.
______________________________
Tamara Zumbrun
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