The alleged incidents contained no racial or ethnic slurs, and for the most part, made no express reference to Hispanics.

Dive Brief:

• A former city of Tampa employee failed to show he was subjected to a hostile work environment based on his Cuban origin and fired because he complained, a federal district court in Florida held July 6.
• Per the ruling in Chavez v. City of Tampa Water Department, the employee had to obtain successive state licenses to maintain his job at a wastewater treatment plant. The city fired him for submitting a license application that falsely stated he met its hours requirement — two days after he was told he was more than 500 hours short. The city also charged him with allegedly coercing a co-worker to sign the application and for not showing up for a mandatory fitness for duty evaluation after he sent government officials an inflammatory video disputing the fraud charges.
• The employee sued the city for harassment and retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Florida law. He claimed he had been harassed because he is Hispanic, citing eight unwelcome incidents over a five-year period. He also alleged he was fired for reporting them. The court granted summary judgment to the city.

Dive Insight:

The ruling is another example of how Title VII limits actionable harassment: None of the alleged incidents directly referred to the employee or contained any derogatory racial or ethnic slurs, and one had no evident connection to national...

Read Full Story: https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMilgFBVV95cUxPVTg3N21kdF94OGV0OGpvQnU2...