Survey finds toxic workplace culture at Louisiana housing agency
2nd March 2022 · 0 Comments
By Wes Muller
Contributing Writer
(lailluminator.com) — Bullying, favoritism, unfair pay and lack of accountability have been rampant within the workplace of the Louisiana Housing Corporation, where allegations of sexual harassment have been leveled against the agency’s previous two executive directors.
These were among the findings of a performance review the Louisiana Legislative Auditor released last Thursday. The report underscores the impact that leadership can have on an organization that has seen five executive directors since its creation in 2011. The Louisiana Housing Corporation (LHC) is a state agency that directs and coordinates housing programs to address the shortage of affordable, decent and safe homes. The lack of stable leadership “has affected morale and other aspects of workplace culture” at LHC, the report stated.
Legislative Auditor Mike Waguespack launched the audit at the request of the LHC’s board chairman in July. Three months earlier, the board suspended executive director Keith Cunningham after an assistant alleged he sexually harassed her over the course of more than three years, though an outside firm hired to investigate would later find no conclusive evidence to support the allegations.
Cunningham said his exit was orchestrated by board members irked over his refusal to hire a Ville Platte housing developer, according to a NOLA.com report from August.
The LHC’s executive director before Cunningham, Frederick Tombar III, resigned in 2015 amid allegations that he promised to protect an employee’s job in exchange for sex.
In September and October 2021, the Legislative Auditor requested interviews with all 13 board members, and seven responded. According to the audit report, the board has not been consistent in evaluating the executive director and has not sought input on the director’s performance from other staff or stakeholders. In response, LHC told the Auditor that the executive director’s contract provides sufficient criteria by which evaluations can be performed.
The auditor also reviewed the organization’s policies and procedures, interviewed LHC employees and conducted an employee survey to evaluate the agency’s workplace culture.
The survey found two of the 99 employees who responded said they experienced unwanted sexual advances, and nine employees either experienced or witnessed comments that were sexual in nature. As of December, LHC had 144 full-time and five part-time employees.
The audit highlighted that many employees don’t trust LHC’s grievance system. The survey found about 31.5 percent of employees felt LHC would not handle their grievance fairly, and 28.2 percent indicated they did not feel comfortable reporting issues to their supervisor, which is the first step of the grievance policy.
Prior to hiring a new human resources director in May 2021, LHC did not maintain documentation of grievances or the outcomes. As a result, LHC was only able to provide the auditors with the five grievances it had on record and the outcome related to only one of them. However, according to the auditor’s survey, employees reported filing at least eight formal grievances.
Just 18.2 percent of employees indicated that morale was high at LHC. Specifically, employees cited several issues affecting morale, such as unfair and inequitable pay, job responsibilities, policies and procedures not being followed, favoritism, lack of teamwork, lack of accountability, and bullying.
The auditor’s first recommendation: LHC should update its sexual harassment policy to include possible disciplinary actions for false reports and a statement notifying its employees of their right to pursue a claim under state or federal law regardless of LHC’s investigation outcome.
Other recommendations include providing in-person sexual harassment training for employees, providing board members with better orientation and training on meeting procedures and etiquette, and setting up an anonymous employee hotline for reporting unethical behavior, such as bullying, harassment and other safety and health violations.
The agency should also develop a policy either prohibiting or requiring disclosure of relationships between supervisors and staff, the audit report said.
LHC accepted most of the recommendations but disagreed with having in-person training, saying its current training is sufficient “during times of COVID-19 restrictions and protocols.” In response, the Auditor wrote that in-person sexual harassment training is recommended by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and “gives employees the ability to ask questions about the harassment policy, complaint system, and related rules and expectations.”
Waguespack’s office plans to conduct a subsequent audit to more comprehensively evaluate the culture at LHC, determine whether LHC is complying with certain policies and procedures, and make further recommendations for improvement.
This article originally published in the February 28, 2022 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
