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Feds
sue Ariz. diner over English ProEnglish aids Legal Defense  Federal prosecutors have filed a language discrimination lawsuit that could bankrupt an Arizona family named the Kidmans. The reason: the Kidmans had the nerve to require employees in their family-owned restaurant to speak English on the job. But the Kidmans are fighting back, refusing to let the government destroy their life's work. And ProEnglish has joined their fight. Here are the details. RD's Drive-In is a typical "Mom and Pop" restaurant owned by Richard and Shauna Kidman in the little town of Page, Arizona. For almost 25 years, the Kidmans' restaurant has been a fixture in this friendly community located adjacent to a Navajo Indian reservation. Many of RD's customers are Navajo, and over the years about 90 percent of their employees have been Navajo also.
ProEnglish believes that the EEOC is acting illegally. Moreover, by continuously attacking English language workplace rules the EEOC is pursuing a policy diametrically opposed to ProEnglish's goal of preserving English as our common language. The Kidmans' restaurant and other small family-owned businesses are especially vulnerable to these kinds of strong-arm tactics because they typically cannot afford to pay the high cost of defending themselves against the EEOC in court. So, ProEnglish is coming to the Kidman's aid by helping with their legal defense, and focusing public attention on their plight. If you can, we encourage you to make a tax-deductible contribution to ProEnglish to assist in this project, or visit the Kidmans' website and donate to them directly. See also: ProEnglish's press release about RD's Drive-in. |
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All
of the Kidman's employees can speak English, but only about half can also
speak Navajo. In the summer of 2000, some of RD's Navajo employees complained
that other employees were insulting and degrading them in the Navajo language.
Some quit their jobs because of it. And customers complained about overhearing
profanity and vulgar terms expressed in Navajo. To try and curb these
abuses, the Kidmans decided to adopt a policy requiring RD's employees
to speak English on the job. To ensure they complied with the law, they
followed the guidelines provided on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's
("EEOC") website for creating workplace language rules. 