Centralized Computer Listing of Complaints : EEOC Has New Weapon to Help It Track Bias Charges

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission unveiled a new data system Thursday designed to tighten enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and correct a problem that allowed more than 1,000 bias cases to lapse last year.

The central computer listing of pending bias complaints, completed last month, will allow EEOC officials to review all the complaints against a particular company. Previously, the commission could compile this information only by contacting its individual district offices.

The EEOC will now be a more “worthy foe” of employers that illegally discriminate against workers and job applicants, Chairman Clarence Thomas said.

Last year, the commission was the target of strong congressional criticism after it lost track of numerous bias complaints, failing to notify complainants of the deadline for taking legal action and allowing more than 1,000 age discrimination complaints to lapse.

Call for ‘Attitude Changes’

The civil rights enforcement agency is responsible for tracking the progress of cases and notifying complainants of their right to file civil lawsuits against their employers 60 days before the cases expire under the statute of limitations.

Rep. Matthew G. Martinez (D-Monterey Park), chairman of the House Education and Labor subcommittee on employment opportunities, which oversees the commission, said that the computer database will help only if the agency is aggressive enough to use it.

“Along with providing a database, there have to be some management attitude changes,” he said. “Those things, a computer won’t do.”

The database’s capabilities include compiling all the charges against a company, even if the charges are made in different regions; gathering complaints by type and region; determining broad patterns of discrimination, and listing employers with more than 25 complaints against them.

The database will also include files from state and local agencies.

With more than 400,000 complaints since 1986 on file, the EEOC expects to build stronger court cases against employers by having documented evidence on employers’ “patterns and practices” in dealing with employees.

To Monitor Timeliness

“A significant part of what the employer community did to us in major cases, in complex cases, was to rely on our own ignorance as a defense,” Thomas said.

Thomas said the new computer listing will allow the commission to monitor the actions of EEOC district offices and make sure they notify complainants in a timely fashion.

Money for compiling the database, which took place over the last several years, came from agency belt-tightening, he said.