Harris v. NYC Human Resources Administration

Background

Mary L. Harris, proceeding pro se, alleged employment discrimination and retaliation against the New York City Human Resources Administration (HRA) and HRA Commissioner Steven Banks. She asserted claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the Rehabilitation Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), the New York State Human Rights Law (NYSHRL), and the New York City Human Rights Law (NYCHRL).

Harris alleged that her director, Joyce Roberson-Steele, repeatedly pressured her to retire, assigned her a disproportionate workload involving potentially violent clients, required her to perform field visits despite her arthritic knee, and subjected her to repeated write-ups and hostile remarks. Harris was later demoted and transferred after disciplinary proceedings. Commissioner Banks rejected an administrative law judge’s recommendation for a one-level demotion and demoted Harris two levels, although the New York Civil Service Commission later reduced the demotion to one level. After Harris transferred to the Crotona Center, she alleged that supervisors used profanity, blamed her for an inoperative laptop, assigned confusing tasks, and circulated an email describing her as “an outstanding problem.”

Defendants moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), which tests whether a complaint adequately states a legally plausible claim.

Timeliness and Individual Liability

The court held that discrete age- and disability-discrimination or retaliation events occurring before September 28, 2018 were untimely under the 300-day deadline applicable to Harris’s ADEA and ADA claims, except that earlier events could contribute to timely hostile-work-environment claims. The court dismissed Harris’s ADEA, ADA, and Rehabilitation Act claims against Banks in his personal capacity because those statutes do not impose personal liability on individual defendants.

The court held that the NYSHRL and NYCHRL can impose individual liability on an employer who actually participates in discriminatory conduct. Because Banks allegedly made the demotion decision, Harris met that threshold for claims concerning his conduct. The court nevertheless dismissed claims against Banks involving hostile work environment and failure to accommodate because Harris did not allege that Banks participated in those conduct-related decisions.

Discrimination Claims

The court divided Harris’s allegations into three groups. For the first group, involving events before the demotion, the court held that repeated write-ups, hostile remarks, a hot work area, difficult subordinates, and missing performance evaluations were not materially adverse employment actions under the federal and state standards. Harris did plausibly allege that being assigned a disproportionately heavy workload involving potentially violent clients, while similarly situated supervisors were not assigned field visits, materially worsened her working conditions. Her age-based claims under the ADEA and NYSHRL based on that workload survived. Her broader age-based claims under those laws were dismissed, while her age-based NYCHRL discrimination claim survived in its entirety. The court dismissed all first-group disability-discrimination claims because Harris did not plausibly allege that her disability motivated the alleged adverse action.

For the second group, the court dismissed all claims based on Harris’s demotion from Supervisor III to Supervisor I and her simultaneous transfer. Although the defendants conceded that the demotion and transfer were adverse employment actions, Harris did not plausibly allege that Banks made those decisions because of her age or disability.

For the third group, involving events at the Crotona Center, the court dismissed all discrimination claims. Harris did not plausibly allege a materially adverse employment action under federal or state law, and she did not allege facts showing that her age or disability motivated the conduct. The court also held that Roberson-Steele’s alleged intent could not be attributed to the new Crotona Center supervisors based on the allegations presented.

Hostile Work Environment Claims

The court dismissed Harris’s disability-based hostile-work-environment claims. It allowed her age-based hostile-work-environment claims concerning the Brooklyn CASA to proceed under the ADEA, NYSHRL, and NYCHRL. The court found that the alleged repeated demands that Harris retire, the statement that she was the oldest employee, and the allegedly unequal assignment of difficult work plausibly described an abusive work environment connected to her age.

The court dismissed all hostile-work-environment claims concerning the Crotona Center. The alleged profanity, criticism, confusing assignments, laptop incident, unanswered communication, and internal email were not sufficiently severe or pervasive under the federal and state standards, and Harris did not plausibly allege that her age or disability motivated the conduct.

Failure to Accommodate and Retaliation

The court declined to dismiss Harris’s failure-to-accommodate claims against HRA under the ADA, Rehabilitation Act, NYSHRL, and NYCHRL because defendants did not sufficiently brief arguments supporting dismissal of those claims. The court did not make a merits determination on whether HRA failed to provide a legally required accommodation.

The court dismissed Harris’s retaliation claims under the ADEA, ADA, Rehabilitation Act, NYSHRL, and NYCHRL. Harris relied primarily on the timing of her Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charges and the alleged adverse actions, but the time gaps were too long to establish a causal connection. The court also found that Harris did not adequately allege that the relevant decisionmakers knew about her charges or acted because of them.

The court dismissed Harris’s FMLA claim. Although she alleged that she had worked for HRA for more than a year, she did not allege that she had worked the required 1,250 hours during the relevant 12-month period. She also did not allege that she requested or took FMLA leave, that defendants denied FMLA benefits, or that an adverse action resulted from exercising FMLA rights.

Disposition

The court granted the motion to dismiss in part and denied it in part. The claims surviving dismissal were: Harris’s ADEA and NYSHRL age-discrimination claims against HRA based on a disproportionate workload occurring from September 28, 2018 through June 20, 2019; her NYCHRL age-discrimination claim against HRA for conduct through June 20, 2019; her ADEA, NYSHRL, and NYCHRL age-based hostile-work-environment claims against HRA concerning the Brooklyn CASA; and her ADA, Rehabilitation Act, NYSHRL, and NYCHRL failure-to-accommodate claims against HRA.