All NJ employers need sexual harassment, discrimination policies, Gov. Murphy says – NorthJersey.com

All employers in New Jersey would put in place policies and training to prevent harassment and discrimination under one of several reforms proposed by Gov. Phil Murphy on Tuesday that are aimed at creating a safer work environment for employees across the state.

The governor’s proposal comes amid heightened attention on how people in power and political organizations, including his own campaign, respond to complaints of harassment or worse. If passed by the Legislature, Murphy’s proposed bills would also require public reports, for the first time, that could help policymakers better understand the prevalence of harassment from board rooms to break rooms.

“The message from survivors and advocates alike has been clear: It’s time for New Jersey to reject the norms of yesterday that overlooked workplace harassment and discrimination as business as usual,” Murphy said in a statement. “With this legislation, New Jersey has the opportunity to set a high standard for progressive workforce policies and give marginalized voices the ability to hold perpetrators accountable.”

The governor’s proposed legislation would better define what a hostile work environment is, specifically that it can exist after just one incident of harassment that does not have to be physical. Murphy also said he would push to lengthen the window of time victims have to bring complaints, up to 1 year to file a complaint with the Division of Civil Rights and up to to 3 years to file a civil lawsuit under New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination.

Those protections would also apply to domestic workers and unpaid interns, according to the governor’s office.

The vulnerabilities of domestic workers, like nannies and housekeepers, and people who work alone were highlighted in an approximately 40-page report released Tuesday by the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights, an arm of the attorney general’s office that has held three public hearings about sexual harassment.

The report, which is based on the comments of about 40 men and women who were both victims of harassment and experts at preventing it, lead to the proposals Murphy announced Tuesday.

One domestic worker found her employer naked in the living room, one was required to bring her boss a towel after his showers and was assaulted in front of a child, and another live-in employee reported her boss climbed into her bed, according to the report.

Power imbalances can increase the likelihood of harassment and also prevent people from making reports out of fear of retaliation, the report says. One immigrant without legal status told of being assaulted “every night for weeks” and being threatened with deportation, the report says. Fostering fear of retaliation is the absence of policies that clearly define and prohibit harassment, the report says.

“This is a problem that plagues this country from coast to coast, in board rooms and break rooms, impacting hourly and salary workers, c-suite executives and college interns,” said Patricia Teffenhart, executive director of the New Jersey Coalition Against Sexual Assault, a nonprofit that partnered with the state to publish the report. “The problem lies with power and control, the kind that a person exploits to abuse or harm another person, and the kind of power and control that allows them to get away with it and keep the victim silent.”

The state will also review how its 51 professional licensing boards, which oversee 720,000 employees with professional licenses in the state, from barbers to lawyers, investigate and respond to sexual harassment issues, Murphy said. The Division of Gaming Enforcement, which oversees the state’s casinos, will begin a similar review.

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The bills backed by Murphy will need to be introduced by the Legislature before they can begin the process of becoming law. Murphy’s support doesn’t necessarily mean the bills will be passed, but there are close allies in the legislature when it comes to issues including the equal treatment of women.

Sen. Loretta Weinberg, D-Bergen, will sponsor the bills, according to Murphy. Weinberg has separately gathered a working group of about 15 women in politics that want to better understand how widespread harassment and assault are. The group formed in response to an NJ.com story in December in which 20 women told of being harassed, assaulted or even raped while working in politics.

Weinberg previously led a special committee that found Murphy’s team bungled an investigation when a campaign volunteer came forward to report she was sexual assaulted by a staffer, Al Alvarez. The committee found that Murphy’s team “failed the volunteer at every step of the way.”

Murphy’s two-year tenure in office has been scarred by a series of allegations, including that women working on his campaign were subject to a toxic work environment.

And even as he announced efforts to make workplaces safer, Murphy repeatedly declined Tuesday to provide details about what consequences or punishment, if any, came to those in his own orbit.

Brendan Gill, Murphy’s former campaign manager who now serves as an adviser and also is an Essex County freeholder, was accused of using degrading language and contributing to a culture of “rank misogyny” on Murphy’s campaign. Gill apologized for his behavior.

Yet Murphy’s staffers pushed back, saying the claims were the fallout of a power struggle between Gill and Julie Roginsky, who left the campaign in mid-2017 and is now leading a national campaign to expose hostile work environments around the country by ending the use of non-disclosure agreements. Roginsky settled a sexual harassment case against Roger Ailes, the leader of Fox News where Roginsky worked as a commentator.

In addition to the assault allegation against Alvarez, Murphy’s campaign investigated and cleared deputy campaign manager Joe Kelley after he threw a chair in the presence of a female staff member. Earlier this year, Murphy’s former campaign staffer and adviser Adam Alonso, who was helping lead the fundraising committee for the 2020 Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee, was fired after a group of women from the committee who did not identify themselves sent a letter saying Alonso consistently “bullied and intimidated” them.

Stacey Barchenger is a reporter in the New Jersey Statehouse. For unlimited access to her work covering New Jersey’s political power structure, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: sbarchenger@gannettnj.com Phone: 732-427-0114 Twitter: @sbarchenger 

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