Black leaders in Denver are calling on the city to do more to ensure that its contractors aren’t shortchanging their workers.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance will hold a news conference Tuesday to deliver the message.
They will discuss two lawsuits filed by current and former employees of Ampco Transportation System Inc., which runs Denver International Airport shuttles and parking lots. Both suits are pending in U.S. District Court in Denver.
One suit, filed in August 2004, alleges that black Ampco workers were fired in retaliation for complaining about racial discrimination. The alleged discrimination included receiving lower pay and fewer benefits than white workers.
Kemal Woods, the lead plaintiff, said he was reassigned to a less desirable position after filing a racial discrimination complaint with state and federal agencies. Woods was fired in July 2004 and was later reinstated.
The other suit, filed in October, says Ampco failed to pay up to 400 current and former bus drivers and lot supervisors the wages they were entitled to under city law.
Ampco has denied the claims in both suits and is seeking to have them dismissed. Representatives of the Los Angeles-based company could not be reached late Friday.
According to the second suit, filed by Woods and five current and former employees, Ampco violated Denver’s “Prevailing Wage” law, which requires contractors to pay wages determined by the city. They are seeking class-action status.
“We want to use the Ampco case as a way to shed light on what we believe is a larger problem,” said Anne Sulton, an Olympia, Wash., attorney who represents the plaintiffs and is former legal counsel for the NAACP in Denver. “We want companies doing business with the city of Denver to comply with the prevailing-wage law.”
“I shouldn’t have to sue a company to make them abide by a local law,” she said. “I have to assume that Ampco isn’t the only company doing this.”
Sulton did not name any other companies suspected of violating the city’s prevailing-wage law.
Menola Upshaw, president of the Denver NAACP, and the Rev. Paul Burleson, president of the Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance, will attend the news conference Tuesday. The plaintiffs also may attend, Sulton said.
Upshaw said Friday that she could not comment on the lawsuits because she had not yet reviewed them.
Denver City Attorney Cole Finegan said he was unfamiliar with the case and could not comment. A representative of the city auditor’s office, which enforces the prevailing-wage law, could not be reached Friday.
Staff writer Greg Griffin can be reached at 303-820-1241 or ggriffin@denverpost.com.
