MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
AMY
BERMAN JACKSON United States District Judge
Plaintiff,
appearing pro se, has sued her former employer, the
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), under Title VII
of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e
et. seq. She alleges race discrimination,
retaliation, hostile work environment, harassment and
wrongful termination.
Defendant
has moved pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure
12(b)(6) for partial dismissal of the complaint based on
plaintiff's failure to exhaust her administrative
remedies on the retaliation claim. Partial Mot. to Dismiss
Pl.'s Compl. [Dkt. # 15]. In addition, defendant seeks
dismissal of plaintiff's race discrimination and hostile
work environment claims to the extent that they are based on
conduct that does not rise to level of an adverse employment
action. Plaintiff admits that the retaliation claim was not
raised at the administrative level, and the Court agrees that
certain claims should be dismissed. So the motion will be
granted for the reasons explained more fully below.
BACKGROUND
1.
Plaintiff's Work History
Plaintiff
is an African American woman who worked for FEMA as a GS-7
legal secretary from October 2011 through April 2013. She was
assigned to the Office of General Counsel's Mission
Support Division and supervised by Ashley Darbo. The gravamen
of plaintiff's complaint is that Darbo “harassed,
discriminated, retaliated and wrongfully terminated her after
she engaged in protected activity twice[.]” Compl.
¶ 4.
The
complaint sets out the following facts, which are accepted as
true for purposes of this motion. Plaintiff alleges that she
complained about Darbo to Darbo's supervisor, Joshua
Stanton, on June 5, 2012 and November 28, 2012, and she
“consulted with Mr. Doug Goudy, EEOC President, ”
on October 24, 2012 and April 19, 2013. Id.
Plaintiff told both Stanton and Goudy that she was
“being harassed and treated differently than Caucasian
employees in the office.” Id. ¶ 5.
Plaintiff
talked to Stanton about Darbo in particular. She told Stanton
that Darbo “was cold and distant towards her . . . was
unapproachable[, ] . . . failed to interact with her, [and]
would single her out, which made her feel unwelcomed when she
had asked questions concerning her work.” Id.
Stanton informed Darbo's immediate supervisor, Leigh
Hoburg, about plaintiff's complaints on June 5, 2012, and
Hoburg, in turn, notified Darbo of the complaint that same
day by email. Id. According to the plaintiff,
“after the complaints, . . . Darbo got mad and got even
and further mistreated [plaintiff] as she was singled out
continuously[.]” Id. ¶ 6. Plaintiff lists
a number of actions that her supervisor then took against
her; the complaint alleges that Darbo:
• told plaintiff that she did not have two 15 minute
breaks;
• reduced her lunch break to 30 minutes;
• ordered her to submit a weekly timed work summary;
• used her flexible schedule against her;
• issued a Letter of Reprimand (LOR) for sending an
overnight mail request to a judge;
• brought her to tears when instructing her to use her
personal sick leave for visiting the FEMA agency nurse;
• “rebelled against excused absence/administrative
leave for visiting the FEMA nurse;”
• “adversely withheld []her annual performance
rating on April 19, 2013, ...