I need help

What is the name of your state? California
I do not know how to briefly submit this. I am currently emplyed by a large chemical company as a fire captain in their on site fire dept. I have worked for them 15 years as a plant operator and 5 as a fire capt. I currently on suspension and fear that I am going to be terminated largely because of two things...I had an affair with a supervisor 5 years ago to which I had to seek help from the company to stop her from causing me problems at work. They let her go, but I have also been punished financially and had letters placed in my personnel file due to this relationship. Secondly I am a member of the emergency response group on our site and the leader of the site Brigade. My company allows the site to go without proper man power to effect a rescue or mitigate a response should the need arise and I have voiced my concerns repeatedly. Recently they performed a contaminated vessel entry, one that would require a minimum number of people trained in rope rescue to effect the rescue, which was a part of the OSHA, NFPA regulated rescue plan and we did not have the people available to perform this rescue should that need have come up. I have recently taken the stance that I inform all people involved in the confined space entries whether or not we have people on site to respond. I have informed my supervisor about this as well to which I recieved no response.
I also recently called the company ethics line to report the site security manager for signing people off as passing CPR training that had never attended the training. This was proven to be an accurate claim and all people were to be positively trained at end of February...this still has not occurred and I have voiced concern on this as well. There are numerous other circumstances such as these. Since the affair, and more recently my claims of inadequate safety or other wrong doings I have had many letters placed in my file, one letter even stated that I needed to refrain from making derogartory comments about individuals. I had many conversations with my supervisor as to why this was placed in my file and I asked for instances when I made derogatory comments about anyone, he finally admitted to me in writing it was not him that had placed that in my file that it had come from the HR director, and that he knew of no circumstances where this had occurred and that there was nothing he could do about it. There are also other items in my file that are not true as well.
Currently we are operating under a security level of Yellow, which mirrors the color coding of the US Homeland security levels. Our safety contingency plan is given to outside agencies such as the Coast Guard and local police departments and in it, it states that certain area's around the site are restricted to parking. The site HR director commonly broke these rules and continued to park inarea's she was not allowed to park and I repeatedly called her on the practice with face to face communication, emails and notes on her car. The plant manager also violated the parking rules and responded to me when told that he could not park there, "If there is a problem, tell anyone that it is my motorcycle and I will move it when I am ready".
All of this brings me here now. Last Saturday night late I was called into work to cover sick leave. I had been on vacation and had just arrived home, and although I was not prepared to work I agreed to come in. I worked a 12 hour shift this day and roughly 8 hours into it I left the site to get a hamburger. I was gone form the site 10 minutes, I took my personal car, stayed in uniform and kept my department radio. It was currently shift change and I was incontact with both the previous dispatcher and the current one coming on shift. The main gate was opened for me me leaving and coming back from the hamburger run and was witnessed by the Coast Guard who wrote a citation stating inadequate ID check based on the previously mentioned contingency plan. THe coast guard has decide to not fine the company or take any action, yet the company has left myself and the dispatcher on suspension. They did however conduct a root cause investigation that determined the practice of opening the gate for emergency response and management personnel was a practice that began long before I was in the dept. and continued on a regular basis up through the date in question. Also all people involved in the investigation had at one time or another also travelled through the gate by having someone just open it for them. Although regardless of this knowledge they are attempting to claim I violated a clear cut procedure and therefore chose to break the rules.
Instead I contend they are attempting to terminate me because of the relationship I had with a supervisor as well as all the safety concerns I continually bring to them.

I think your previous post from last year and response needs to be provided as it appears this was your question immediately prior to your vacation and this year's series of events.

I also have some quesitons about this affair. Was this handled under your company's sexual harassment policy? Were you two of equal standing with your company or did one of you have supervision over the other? Were you free to have a relationship. Were any civil actions taken such as a restraining order? As to the safety violations, have you reported them to Cal-OSHA etc.?

With this incident, you were called back from vacation, prior to your scheduled duty and without enough time to bring your lunch with you. The state of California has mandated lunch and break requirements, however there are exceptions for certain categories of employment, I would hope that would would know what they are for your profesion. Do you have a union? I live near a store and I regularly see the fire truck pull up into the lot, two fire fighters get out, leaving the driver with the truck, they go into the store and shop for their next meal, leave and lo and behold another truck from another company arrives, I can unerstand why they have to bring the truck but think it could cost the tax payers less if they coordinated this better or bought more than one meal at a time. What I am getting at is that It is clear that you needed to eat, the problem is did you violate current applicible policy in leaving and returning without proper clearance? Is there any appeal process with the USCG? What is the enforcement of infractions for others?

You may possibly have some sort of sexual harasment case depending of information we don't have here, have you filed an EEOC compliant at any point? I suggest you seek counsel with an employment and or civil rights attorney who may be able to advise you. The new regulations for homeland security superceed old policies so past lax enforcement is not a defense, it may not be fair, but that is how it is. You should also know that once you become a whistle blower, your career is going to be in jeopardy, it is not fair, but that is how it works, no matter what you report or if it is proven true, or how many lives you save, there is always a price for blowing the whistle, you are lucky to have survived so long.

Here is the text of your related question, it does look like they are setting you up.
08-10-2003, 09:39 AM FullFog
Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2003
Harassment ?
California

A new female employee recently quit her job at my company due to what she felt was harassment. I was her trainer in one portion of her job. She has now informed me that she was told by coworkers to be careful of me, that I was a womanizer and could not be trusted. I recently confronted the individuals that made these remarks and was told that my supervisor had discussions with these coworkers and asked them to determine if something was "going on" between the new female employee and I. I feel like I have been set up and placed in a hostile work enviroment....is it legal for people to make accusations about me to people I am responsible to train? Can my supervisor ask coworkers to check up on me without first talking to me about any percieved wrong doing? Doesn't he create more of a hostile work enviroment for by enlisting coworkers to "spy" on me? I want to take legal action but I am not sure what to do.
FullFog

08-10-2003, 11:13 AM
cbg Senior Member

1.) Yes. It is legal for people to make any accusation they feel warranted against anyone. The fact that you are training them does not make you immune.

2.) Yes. Your supervisor is required by law, once the complaint is made, to investigate, but the law does not mandate what in order s/he talks to people. If s/he wants to talk to your co-workers first, there is nothing legally preventing that.

3.) No. You are not in a hostile environment to begin with. That phrase is limited to those who are either being subjected to sexual harassment (you are not) or illegal discrimination under Title VII (nothing in your post even remotely suggests this to be the case).

You do not currently have a case to take legal action on.

I am not a municipal fire dept, I am industrial. There is no rule against me leaving the job site briefly to get food, I am not (that I know of) in trouble for this.
I have not blown the whistle to any government agency...I have instead been trying to work with my supervision on site (Chemical engineers) in getting the necessary safety, although safety costs money and money is not supposed to be spent. My company chartered a group of individuals to perform a six sigma project designing what was needed to maintain safety to on site personnel and surrounding community. They spent a lot of money designing what needed to happen in regards to training, how many responders we needed to have etc.... These findings were published, although they were never followed. I have pushed for us to begin following these recommendations and I was told by a supervisor we will not follow them. He won't give specific reasoning as to why we will not follow them, but it is widely known we will not spend the money even though this is what their six sigma team decided was needed.

The Coast Guard is not going to issue any fines or warnings. They indicated they only wanted to help us increase our safety awareness. Their claim was that we had "insufficient ID check" since I entered the site without using my electronic ID card. The reason I was able to enter the site without the use of my card was because I had worked all day with the same dispatchers... they are the ones that control the opening of the main gate... they knew I went for a hamburger, I was expected back within a certain time frame... I arrived within that time frame in a known vehicle and talking to them via our company radio, therefore they opened the gate and allowed me entrance as I approached the gate. The Coast Guard drove up behind me to the gate in an unmarked vehicle and the gate was not opened for them.

This opening of the gate has been a common practice for the emergency responders on site longer than I have been there. This practice occasionally occurs for some management personnel as well and it has never been questioned. Nor thought of as improper. In fact some of the people sitting in my review have had the gate opened for them on many occasions and have never stated it was not the correct practice, instead they have said thank you. What I am getting at is no one felt this practice was innncorrect. All the dispatchers have been spoken too and have said exactly what I say here. The other part of this is that the site manager and HR director commonly break the rules in regards to the site safety plan and even when they are called on the practice they are defiant or will still continue to do as they please.

I was unhappy with the way the harrassment case has gone, although all I wanted to do was maintain my job. I let I go because I will still doing the job I wanted to do, and I have a lot of passion for my job ..... The woman I had the affair with was the supervisor of this dept. She wanted me to leave my wife and family (we were both married) and I refused to do so. I attempted to end the relationship with the supervisor and she started doing crazy things even though she already had another boyfriend. She started telling people at work that I had physicaly abused her and she did not know what to do about it. She made threats against my wife and started sending letters to my home and at one point parked her car on my front lawn with her kid's in tow began to beat on my front door. Some where in between this all she was given supervision of another area and I was given a new supervisor.

One night while at work she made attempts to talk to me, I was busy with work and could not talk. She parked her car behind mine and blocked my vehicle and beat on my window until others around were able to talk her into leaving. I went to my new supervisor for help. I asked him to please just talk to her. Instead he went to the HR director and they started a full blown investigation. During the investigation they accused me of being given perferential treatment etc... all the items I was accused of were unsubstantiated. They then asked me how I could prove a relationship had occurred, and wanted to know if I had emails? I said I did and produced a few on their request. When it was all over she no longer worked for the company (I think they let her resign)....but then they also lowered my pay scale, took away bonus pay and refused any raise for the following year. They also put a last chance letter in my file stating I had an inappropriate affair with my comp manager (she was my comp manager for 1 month and did not effect any of my money ever) and that I misused company resources (the emails they asked me to produce were now being used against me for discipline). I was just happy to keep my job and I did not push anything on the request of the supervisior I had brought the information too.

After this the HR director seemed to take much interest in pushing penalities on me regardless of what the evidence showed. I have worked here 20 years, 15 of which had relatively nothing placed in my file, since the affair (last 5 years) I have had things placed in it non stop.

The last posting I did in 2003 was when I became stuck in mud while doing rounds off site. Someone stated to my supervisor that they thought a woman was with me when I was stuck, so unknown to me he began an investigation and questioned coworkers of mine as to wether or not I had a female trainee with me this evening. From this supervisors questioning, the coworkers went to the female trainee and warned her that I couldn't be trusted, and that I was a womanizer.

When I found out this had happened I was very upset and confronted the supervisor in a company sponsered conflict resolution. The arbitrator in the resolution sided with me and stated that the supervisor placed me in a bad position by going to my coworkers and suggesting something may have happened... I know I did not portray this well when it was posted last, it is not easy to convey what is happening by typing.

I have heard that whistleblowing does have a bad effect on the person that whistleblows, and I do not want to hurt any of the people that I have worked with over the years. I am very concerned with this.
But I need to do what I can to protect my income and family. Recently I had a circumstance where I called the companies Ethics line (an 800 number that promises following up on unethical practices) on the site security manager. He also teaches CPR to the site response teams. I had first hand knowledge that he signed people off on CPR training that actually never attended the training course. Since past efforts had failed to have my immediate supervision handle things, I instead called the ethics line. This caused a big problem on my site and upset a lot of managers for bringing bad light to view. To date they still have not followed through with the CPR training they said they would have done although they have informed Ethics line that all is complete. I have continued to question them on this in the recent months.

I have been isolated from coworkers for the past four days and I was told by a supersior I most likely will lose my job. I called the company nurse asking for help with anxiety attacks and when the HR director heard of my contact with the nurse she demanded from the nurse to know if I had threatened anyone or myself. This exchange was not done in private, this occurred in front of others besides the nurse. Also involved in my investigation is the site security manager, the same one I called the ethics line on for falsifying training (CPR) records.

I'm sorry this is so long. I am also sure I have not explained things well....I am trying to find out if anyone thinks I can fight this.....I need to know prior to the company terminating me. Please help if you can.

Please consult an attorney regarding discrimination, it looks like sexual harassment and since the woman was your supervisor she and the company would have responsibility. Hopefully you have some proof in addition to the emails, like was a police report made? witnesses, do you have anything from the investigaiton? You might contact EEOC and make appropriate reports to Cal-OSHA.
With the USCG it sounds like if anyone was in error it was the person opening the gate and you shoud not have been sent home for that. Call an attorney on Monday morning. Good luck.