CEO says manager is hiring ‘too many’ Black workers, not to hire Afghans, feds say
The CEO of a Colorado business group gave a human resources manager a handwritten note telling her to hire applicants based on race — after saying she was hiring “too many” Black employees, according to a new federal lawsuit.
Managers at Mile Hi Companies were told to restrict the amount of Black applicants who were hired, to avoid hiring women for manual labor jobs and to stop hiring Afghan applicants for bakery positions, the lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission says.
The business, established by the Taddonio family in 1901, distributes food and paper products. It is still run by the Taddonio family.
Mile Hi Companies didn’t immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment Oct. 2.
According to a complaint, in April 2019, the written note that CEO Tony Taddonio gave the HR manager instructed her to stick to Denver’s demographics when making hiring decisions.
He told her “only hire 10% Blacks” and “no more Afghanistans at the bakery,” the complaint says.
Taddonio is accused of saying he wanted to hire Hispanic women in the bakery, not Afghans, because they “do a better job,” according to the complaint.
When it came to warehouse jobs, Taddonio told the company’s vice president that “pretty girls” shouldn’t be hired because other warehouse workers wouldn’t be productive and said Mile Hi Companies “should only hire ‘fat girls,’” the complaint says.
Now, the EEOC is suing Mi Hile Companies for discriminatory hiring directives and for retaliating against the HR manager by firing her after she disagreed with the hiring instructions, the agency announced in an Oct. 1 news release.
The HR manager gets fired
Shortly after the HR manager was hired by Mile Hi Companies, the business’ vice president, who supervised her, told her “she needed ‘to be careful how many Blacks’ she hires because CEO Taddonio ‘does not like a lot of Blacks in the warehouse,’” according to the complaint.
The vice president warned her to “be careful” a second time when the HR manager said it was illegal to discriminate against applicants, the complaint says.
A few years later, Taddonio told the HR manager that Black employees kept quitting and accused them of not wanting to work, according to the complaint.
The vice president later told her to stop hiring Black applicants, the complaint says.
On another occasion, Taddonio walked into the HR manager’s office, saying “he ‘was not prejudiced,’ but that Mile Hi ‘cannot be hiring Blacks because they do not work,’” according to the complaint.
He told her he wanted her to hire “younger” Hispanic men instead, the complaint says.
Taddonio is also accused of telling the vice president to avoid hiring Black applicants, saying Black employees are “lazy workers” and “poor employees,” according to the complaint.
Since at least 2015, Black applicants were turned away because of their race, Afghan applicants were denied bakery jobs because of their national origin and female applicants were turned away from manual labor positions, the complaint says.
In April 2019, after the HR manager interviewed a qualified Black applicant, the vice president warned her that she would lose her job if the employee “didn’t work out,” according to the complaint.
The HR manager then met with the president of Mile Hi Companies and expressed she was scared she’d lose her job if she hired Black applicants, the complaint says.
The president told her she had a reason to worry before speaking with her a few days later about possibly firing her, according to the complaint.
The HR manager told the president “Mile Hi was creating a hostile work environment for her because she had refused to stop hiring Black applicants,” the complaint says.
Then she was fired on April 24, 2019, according to the complaint.
The EEOC filed its lawsuit after trying to reach a pre-litigation settlement with Mile Hi, according to the agency.
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 “protects workers who refuse to follow orders to discriminate by making retaliation illegal,” Mary Jo O’Neill, the EEOC’s Phoenix District regional attorney, said in a statement.
“Hiring should be based on a worker’s merits and qualifications, not based on unfounded racist and sexist stereotypes,” O’Neill said.
This story was originally published October 2, 2024 at 8:43 AM with the headline "CEO says manager is hiring ‘too many’ Black workers, not to hire Afghans, feds say."
.jpg)