Janitor Alleges Sex Discrimination

A former Harvard janitor filed a sex discrimination complaint against a University subcontractor last month, sparking protest from her union and student activists against the University on Friday.

In the complaint, which was filed with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) on April 4, Marlene Soprani accuses ACME/Pioneer Janitorial Services manager Carlos Da Silva of telling her that a job she applied for was “more for a man.” Da Silva then publicly humiliated her in connection with her interest in the shift, Soprani alleges. She was fired a few weeks later.

Da Silva said yesterday that he had not discriminated against Soprani, citing her poor performance as the reason she was denied the job and later fired.

“Marlene Soprani was never told that she was being denied the position due to being a female,” he said. “She was told that she was not getting the position because she was not qualified based on her record.”

“We have tried everything within our power to rehabilitate her, and nothing was possible,” Da Silva added. “I feel for her, but we have to make decisions.”

The University is currently investigating the accusations, according to Marilyn D. Touborg, director of communications at Harvard’s Office of Human Resources.

“Any report of discrimination on the Harvard campus is taken very seriously whether it involves a Harvard employee or an employee of an outside contractor working here,” she wrote in an e-mail.

Touborg declined to comment on the nature of the investigation.

ACME/Pioneer Vice President Frank Gello denied that the company is guilty of discrimination, pointing to the fact that a woman now holds the job that Soprani was denied.

“We’ve been a business for 54 years, and it’s the only claim we’ve ever had,” he said.

Gello said he is preparing to meet with Soprani and her union representative tomorrow, noting that he only became aware of the incident last week when he received a copy of the MCAD complaint.

“I’d like to talk to her and a union representative head on,” Gello said. “I want to settle all the issues when I meet [them] on Thursday—I’m encouraged that we can.”

ACME/Pioneer has agreed to participate in formal mediation with Soprani and is waiting for the union to suggest a date, according to Gello, who refused to comment on what terms the company might be willing to accept.

Harvard’s Responsibility?

Though the discrimination complaint was filed against a subcontractor—and not Harvard—some feel the University still bears responsibility for such actions.

“The building manager [of the library] is in close touch with the contractor,” said Aaron Bartley, an organizer for Harvard’s janitors’ union, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 254. “It’s not as if the contractor’s off on its own without any oversight by Harvard.”

Roughly 40 students and workers gathered on the steps of Widener Library Friday afternoon to protest Soprani’s firing and alleged discrimination.

The rally, which was sponsored by the Progressive Student Labor Movement (PSLM) and SEIU Local 254, was one of the largest recent PSLM actions. The Radcliffe Union of Students was also involved in planning the event, according to RUS Co-President Jessica M. Rosenberg ’04.

The protestors gathered signatures for a sign that read “Management Stop the Abuse: Reinstate Marlene Soprani with back pay.”

After the rally, they marched around to the back entrance of Widener to deliver the petition to library management, chanting slogans such as “No Justice! No Peace!” The group was not permitted to enter the library but left the petition outside its back door.

During the rally, Bartley accused Harvard of failing to hold its subcontractors to the labor principles that it embraced in the wake of the Spring 2001 living wage sit-in.

“I think both students and the union are fed up with treatment such as Marlene received in a University setting which has adopted a statement of principles which explicitly states that each and every individual on the campus deserves respect and fair treatment,” he said.

Bartley told the crowd that they would not stop protesting until Soprani’s issues are resolved.

“We’re going to tell the library management that they have to deal with this problem and if not, next time we’re going to go to [University President Lawrence H.] Summers and tell him he has to deal with this problem,” Bartley said.

Soprani—who spoke to the crowd in Spanish through a translator—said she originally worked a day shift when she started at Harvard about two years ago. But ACME/Pioneer’s management forced her to take a night shift last September to keep her job, she said.

Soprani said that while she was still employed on the night shift, she applied for a day-shift opening in Lamont Library. She said that is when her boss, Da Silva, told her that the position was “more a man’s job,” saying it required heavy lifting.

Although the job was first awarded to a man, he turned it down, and it subsequently was awarded to a female employee with less seniority than Soprani, she said.

The standard practice would have been to give Soprani the job because of her seniority, according to Bartley. He added that this was especially true because she had originally held a more-desirable day shift before being forced to take a night shift.

At Friday’s rally, Soprani said she is having trouble paying her rent, though she said in an interview afterwards she has managed to make ends meet with a friend’s help.

While Soprani said she hopes this complaint might end the discrimination she said she experienced, she is skeptical of how she would be treated upon returning.

“I think that the discrimination might end but the day-to-day persecution won’t,” she said.

But Soprani said despite her expectation of poor treatment, she needs the job to pay her bills.

“I need the job,” she said. “It’s the only solution.”

Soprani said that if she doesn’t get reinstated, she hopes to win money through a court action and move to another state to seek work. But, more than anything, she said wants the dispute to end.

“I hope that this is over,” Soprani said.

—Staff writer Stephen M. Marks can be reached at marks@fas.harvard.edu.