Gov. Paul LePage has stepped into the ring regarding a religious discrimination case against Moody’s Diner that the Maine Human Rights Commission ruled on last November, according to the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting.
In November, the commission found there were “reasonable grounds” to believe Moody’s had discriminated against longtime employee Allina Diaz on the basis of religion by creating a hostile work environment and in terms and conditions of her employment, and that Moody’s retaliated against her for asserting her rights, according to meeting minutes.
The company denied any discrimination or retaliation, according to the investigator’s report.
The report of investigator Michele Dion included a transcript of an Aug. 2, 2013 conversation between Diaz, Moody’s Diner co-owner Dan Beck, and Beck’s son, who Diaz was dating at the time.
The transcript includes comments from Beck about Diaz never making a “profession of faith,” that the son’s and Diaz’s lifestyles “display that you don’t believe in Christ,” and a request both the son and Diaz seek other employment.
According to the transcript, Beck said the discussion is both personal and work-related.
Beck, however, said the transcript was stripped down to include only what Dion thought was relevant to the case, and does not include the entire conversation.
Beck said Feb. 18 he did approach the governor and other elected officials over his concerns about the evidence and investigation the commissioners relied on in making their decision.
“My reason for doing so, I believe I was treated in a very biased, unfair, and I would say an abusive way by the Maine Human Rights Commission, so I did what I thought was my right as a citizen to appeal to my elected officials,” Beck said.
“I knew full well going to meet with the governor [that] he may not be able to do anything to help with my case,” but thought meeting with him about the issue might be a “catalyst for change in our state,” Beck said.
According to a memo from Amy Sneirson, the commission’s executive director, LePage called her the morning of Feb. 6, the day a conciliatory hearing between the two parties in the Diaz/Moody’s case was scheduled, and asked for the hearing to be postponed so he could investigate Beck’s concerns.
Sneirson told LePage the parties were already on their way to the hearing and statute did not provide for review of the commission’s decision by the governor or anyone else, before she ultimately decided not to postpone the hearing, according to the memo.
The Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting obtained the memo through Maine’s Freedom of Access Act and shared it publicly.
LePage, however, “said he was not interfering, but only trying to make sure there was no ‘ethical breach’ in the case involving an audio recording he had been told was edited,” according to a report by the center.
In an interview with the center on Feb. 17, LePage said the diner’s representatives told him the commission’s investigator edited a tape recording made by Diaz and the commissioners got only a “sound bite,” not the whole tape.
According to Sneirson’s memo, Diaz’s attorney, Rebecca Webber, said the entire audio recording had been provided.
Beck said he was treated unfairly because the commissioners’ decision was based on an edited, stripped-down version of the tape’s transcript. Beck also took issue with the investigator’s approach to the case, which he said was biased.
Objective evidence showing Diaz’s hours worked, shifts worked, and income earned had steadily increased over a three-year period was submitted and ignored, Beck said.
“I never, ever told this young lady that she had to follow Jesus or believe in Jesus in order to work here,” he said.
Sneirson told the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting her investigator “did an excellent job and I don’t believe she did anything improper … I stand by her fully.”
While the conciliation hearing between the two parties was held on Feb. 6, it did not end in a settlement, according to Beck.
“The last offer that we put on the table, at least what I was told, was rejected, and Allina and her party didn’t put (a) counter(offer) in,” Beck said.
LePage’s involvement with the case reportedly did not end with his phone call to Sneirson.
According to the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, a week after LePage’s call to Sneirson, Sneirson sent the governor’s office a request for about $4,000 to fund a temporary fill-in position.
Sneirson told the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting Feb. 16 the governor’s office informed her he would not sign the request, but gave no reason.
LePage denied he was interfering in a case that had already been ruled on, he told the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, and said he won’t approve the financial request until his staff attorney “gets back to me … to make sure everything is above board. As soon as I get that, yea or nay, if it’s yea, the financial order will be signed immediately; if it’s nay, it will never be signed until we get to the bottom of this.”
