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NAACP to support lawsuit against Tulsa Transit over alleged workplace hostility
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NAACP to support lawsuit against Tulsa Transit over alleged workplace hostility

More than 10 former and current Metro Link Tulsa employees are calling the NAACP for help with their claims that Tulsa Transit has a hostile work environment. Employees claim that managers threatened and discriminated against them.

“This has been going on for six years,” said Alicia Moore, current Tulsa Transit bus driver.

He and former colleagues who spoke to News Channel 8 say managers created a hostile work environment, harassed and bullied employees, falsified records, threatened people with guns and had a list of unfair dismissals.

“He got angry because I was subpoenaed because I hadn’t been represented for six years, and he walked at me with a knife,” Moore said.

He adds that he eventually filed a police report, but nothing came of it. This police report is one of many documents used in the Oklahoma EEOC complaint filed by him and his former colleagues. Records show the Oklahoma EEOC gave them permission to sue Tulsa Transit.

“They lost about 250 people. They lost over 250 people. They lost a lot of drivers,” Moore said.

We reached out to Tulsa Transit multiple times over two weeks for comment. We did not get an answer.

Former employees say they followed the chain of command when it came to complaining about management. Nakia Burris is a former Tulsa Transit supervisor. He was the person employees would go to when they had a complaint, but Burris said upper management made things harder as the complaints escalated.

“The drivers come up and say, ‘Can you give us a pain?’ “They were asking, ‘I need to go to him and say, ‘Hey, I need a complaint, can you put one in the mailboxes because he took them all out,'” Burris said.

Former employees claimed that when they complained, upper management retaliated and fired them.

“The last one was a hostile work environment that affected my pay and I was bullied. I presented that. She (Burris) heard him say I was going to fire Shiela for that,” said Sheila Hill, a former bus driver.

Hill was there for five years before he was fired.

“Attendance is good. No writing. No crashes. No nothing,” Hill said.

Crystal Carter is also a former manager of Tulsa Transit. He said he stood up to a driver who was assaulted because he didn’t like the way upper management handled the situation.

“I was discharged from the service. They sent me home and two days later I was fired,” Carter said.

NAACP Tulsa Branch President Francetta Mays said they will help pay for lawyers to represent current and former employees.

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