HispanicBusiness

WASHINGTON, Dec. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- JPMorgan Chase will be the focus of nationwide demonstrations this Thursday, December 7, protesting alleged discrimination by service contractors the financial services giant hires to clean and to protect its buildings. The actions will also underscore JPMorgan Chase business and employment practices that increasingly deny African Americans, Latinos, and other immigrants access to banking services and provide a poor quality of services to those communities.

Cleaners and security officers who work in JPMorgan Chase properties sometimes face poor and physically demanding working conditions including near-poverty wages with no health benefits or wage increases. Some workers, many of whom are immigrants, have reported blatant prejudice and hostility at the hands of JPMorgan Chase contractors.

The company JPMorgan Chase hires to clean its sprawling McCoy Corporate Center in Columbus, Ohio -- Mid-American Cleaning Contractors (MACC) -- is under investigation by state and federal agencies for repeated instances of national origin, religious, and gender discrimination against workers from the African nation of Somalia.

A MACC supervisor is accused of threatening Somali workers with termination if they did not give her gifts. The workers include a pregnant cleaner who was threatened with unsafe work assignments if she did not provide the supervisor with clothing and perfume. Workers were also subjected to verbal abuse (for example, one was told he could not work around children because he looked like "an animal") and religious prejudice by a supervisor who forbade them from using any sinks to wash as required by Islam before prayer.

"When I prayed I had to hide," said Sado Abdi, a former MACC cleaner. "We should have the freedom to practice our religion."

MACC has responded to inquiries by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, and the City of Columbus by terminating some cleaners. Workers have continued to defend their rights by filing charges with the National Labor Relations Board for retaliation against at least five employees who were coming together to form a union with the Service Employees International Union to improve working conditions and to have a voice on the job.

In addition to possible illegal conduct by JPMorgan Chase contractors, the financial services firm itself is under scrutiny for the working conditions at its properties, its lending practices in communities of color, and its consumer banking practices.

For example, according to recent data compiled by a federal oversight agency, African Americans who applied for loans with JPMorgan Chase were more than 80% more likely than whites to be denied approval. Latinos who were granted loans were more than twice as likely as whites to receive a high-cost loan.

On Thursday, December 7, workers and community groups will participate in actions in New York City, Boston, Newark, N.J., Washington, D.C., Chicago, Columbus and Cleveland, Ohio, Indianapolis, Ind., Los Angeles, and London to call on JPMorgan Chase to use its position as a huge presence in the United States economy to act positively by demanding responsible business and employment practices of itself and its contractors. The actions are in observance of International Human Rights Day, which focuses on ending poverty and discrimination.

A new website, http://www.chasemonitor.org/, provides consumer information on JPMorgan Chase products and services, and chronicles the financial giant's business and employment practices. Service Employees International Union

Web site: http://www.seiu.org/http://www.chasemonitor.org/