Three veteran Fresno Unified school nurses have filed a discrimination lawsuit against the district in Fresno County Superior Court, claiming that they were passed over for management or professional development committee jobs because of their ages.

The lawsuit brought by nurses Joni Kolb, Janell Beamon, and Heidi Sagaser alleges that Liz Torres, director of Health Services, refers to nurses over the age of 50 as the “older nurses” and allegedly told Sagaser, now 70, that she “did not like the older nurses, as they always ask for extra pay when they are asked to do extra work, and that they are afraid of COVID.”

The three are seeking damages for lost income, emotional and mental distress, and violation of their “civil and statutory” rights in the lawsuit, which was filed last month by attorney Howard Sagaser, Heidi Sagaser’s husband.

Fresno Unified spokeswoman Nikki Henry said Monday that the district can’t comment on pending or current litigation.

Less Experienced Nurses Favored

The lawsuit alleges the following: When Kolb, who is 63 and has worked for the district for more than 15 years, sought a job description for a nurse manager/educator position, Torres told her there was no description. Kolb believes that Torres was trying to deter her from applying.

The interview panel for the manager position included Torres, who had a clear nursing credential for less than three years, another manager with a clear nursing credential of less than two years, and a school nurse with one year of experience and no clear nursing credential.

Although the district employs many veteran school nurses, none were on the interview panel.

Kolb alleges that the person selected for the manager’s job is an RN under the age of 40 with no school nurse or administrative credential. Because the selected person had no experience as a school nurse, the person would not be able to apply for an administrative credential for at least five years, even though that was a stated requirement for the position.

Kolb was told she was not selected for the manager job because of an alleged lack of experience or inability to do the job, when in fact she was more qualified and has more experience than the person selected. She believes she was not selected solely due to her age.

Pediatric Nurse Practitioner Rejected

Beamon, 59, who has worked for the district for 24 years and is a nationally certified pediatric nurse practitioner, applied for a nurse educator position but was not selected by Torres, who told her that she had failed to mention the need to continuously train current nurses “and that the district wanted progress.”

Training nurses has been a longtime part of Beamon’s work with the district as well as at Fresno City College and Fresno Pacific University.

Beamon believes that the person selected for the job was “much younger” and less qualified than she is.

‘Condescending, Rude’ Responses to Emails

Sagaser said that she had requested a private meeting with Torres to discuss the belief of older nurses that Torres was biased against them. But when she raised the issue, Torres became angry and began to “rant” against veteran nurses, and the next day posted an implied threat on Facebook against those who questioned her management.

Sagaser subsequently noticed a change in her working conditions, with Torres not responding in a timely fashion to her phone calls or emails. When Torres did respond, her emails were “condescending, discounting, and rude.” Torres also resisted Sagaser’s request for supplies for students on the eLearn Academy campus.

Veteran Nurses Not Selected for Panel

The suit also says that after Torres became director, she disbanded a longtime advisory/lead nurse panel and replaced it with a professional learning committee. But despite their experience Kolb, Beamon, and Sagaser were not selected for the committee and instead Torres selected school nurses with less experience. Committee members are eligible for additional pay.

The lawsuit claims that four of the five applicants who were rejected were 56 years old or older, with nine to 23 years of experience, and all had clear nursing credentials, while only one of the six who were accepted had a clear nursing credential, and their experience ranged from one to 5 years.

After the district’s Human Resources department rejected the initial discrimination claims by the three nurses, the School Board ordered an additional investigation, the lawsuit says. But when the district hired a Sacramento attorney who said he would be bound by attorney-client privileges, it raised questions by the plaintiffs over the transparency of that follow-up investigation, the lawsuit says.

The plaintiffs are seeking a jury trial. A case management conference has been scheduled for July 11.

FUSD Nurses’ Lawsuit