Diverse Docket: Judge Tosses Bias Suit Against City College of S.F.

A federal judge has dismissed a former student’s discrimination suit against the City College of San Francisco, finding insufficient evidence that a racially hostile environment existed and that the school failed to adequately resolve the problem.

The controversy began in August 2015 when Carol Thomas, who is African-American, asked a White counselor to make a phone call verifying her enrollment so she could receive unemployment benefits, the decision said. The suit alleges that the counselor failed to make the call, spoke to Thomas in a “negative tone,” told her to see a different counselor, and dumped out her purse.

She also met once with a dean to complain, but the dean declined to arrange a second meeting, according to the decision.

“Based solely on these interactions — and the fact the counselor is White while she is Black — she alleges that the counselor exhibited ‘a discriminatory attitude and harassing conduct’ rising to the level of ‘racist behavior and oppression with the intent to keep racial segregation among the students in school programs,’” U.S. District Judge Haywood Gilliam Jr. wrote in his decision.

But those “conclusory allegations” aren’t enough to show discrimination, Gilliam said.

In addition, Gilliam said Thomas’s “unsupported allegations arising from a single unsatisfactory interaction” with the counselor and the dean’s refusal to hold a second meeting with her cannot support a hostile environment claim.

Gender bias rejected