Former Kaiser Foundation Nurse Alleges She Was Victim of Discrimination, Retaliation

A former Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Inc. nurse is suing the health organization, alleging she was subjected to disparate treatment as a Latina and then terminated in 2023 when she complained. Kaiser Foundation as well as Kaiser Permanente both maintain regional offices in Pasadena.

Maria Franco-Fitchett’s Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit alleges wrongful termination, age, disability and race discrimination, failure to provide reasonable accommodations and engage in the interactive process, whistleblower retaliation and California Family Rights Act violations. Franco- Fitchett seeks in excess of $500,000 in both compensatory and punitive damages in the suit brought Friday.

A Kaiser representative issued a statement Monday regarding the lawsuit.

“Due to pending litigation and this case being a personnel matter, we are unable to comment on this particular case,” the statement read. “However, Kaiser Permanente has strong policies and procedures in place that specifically prohibit any type of discrimination against our employees, whom we value as our greatest resource.”

Kaiser hired Franco-Fitchett as a licensed vocational nurse in 1999 and she was the oldest person working in her facility when she was terminated at age 60, the suit states.

In the last few years of her employment, the plaintiff was regularly passed over for trainings to improve her skills and advance her career that instead went to younger workers, requiring Franco-Fitchett to have to ask other nurses to assist her with job duties for which she had not been schooled, the suit alleges.

“Plaintiff was humiliated as she had to explain to patients that they had to wait because she hadn’t been trained on that device or questioned by coworkers how she didn’t know how to perform that job function,” according to the suit.

A manager told her it would be too expensive to train her on a new outreach program and non-Latino workers were given preferential treatment regarding responsibilities, trainings and the application of various policies and discipline, the suit states.

Starting in 2021, one of Franco-Fitchett’s supervisors started asking her when she was going to retire, but the plaintiff said she did not wish to quit, the suit states.

In response, the supervisor gave such responses as “I’m sure there are a lot of things you want to do, but you can’t because you’re at work” or “Oh, it’s because you’re a new grandma,” according to the suit.

In June 2023, Franco-Fitchett provided medical paperwork justifying her request for intermittent leave because of her back pain, but the plaintiff was often told that staff shortages prevented her from taking specific days off, the suit states.

Franco-Fitchett was terminated last November and says she was told it was for her violation of a policy not identified in the lawsuit, but the plaintiff believes she lost her job for discriminatory reasons, because she sought to take a medical leave and in retaliation for speaking out, the suit states.