CFA Settles Case Over Racist, Hostile Work Environment

Recently, CFA successfully mediated a settlement for a Sacramento State faculty member. In the grievance, CFA noted that the university violated CFA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement by producing an unsafe and hostile work environment for Dr. David Moore, based on Moore’s race and ethnicity. The grievance placed blame on the campus for not training faculty on how to handle disputes without involving the campus police. After nearly three years of suffering from the hardship of the incident, in which Moore was unable to catch up with his research/scholarship due to fighting this grievance and the harm caused by the cop-calling incident, CFA was set to arbitrate the matter. Prior to the start of arbitration, the parties were able to mediate a settlement agreement.

Moore is an associate professor in the College of Business Administration. Since Moore was first hired in 2011, he served as a faculty advisor to the Student Investment Fund (SIF), a club/class hybrid. At the start of the Fall 2018 semester, Moore attended the initial SIF meeting with no incident. When he attended the second SIF meeting of the semester, one of Moore’s colleagues confronted him about his presence at the meeting. Moore’s colleague subsequently asked that the meeting be halted until Moore left. When he refused to leave, Moore’s colleague called campus police on him. Moore’s colleague had previously received the instruction from an associate dean to call the police on Moore if he appeared at the meeting. At no point during the SIF meeting was Moore disruptive, and when the campus police arrived, Moore was initially asked to speak with officers outside of the meeting room. The shocking incident was reported on by Mother Jones as an illustration of racism faced by many people of color across the country.  Although Moore was still able to remain in the SIF meeting, the experience was both harrowing and embarrassing, and disturbed many of the students present.