Portland Radio Group Employee Files Discrimination Complaint

RADIO ONLINE | Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Randi Kirshbaum

Longtime Portland radio host Randi Kirshbaum has filed employment discrimination complaints against her former employer, Portland Radio Group, and its parent corporation, Saga Communications. WMTW News 8 reports that Kirshbaum's attorney, David Webbert, filed the complaints on Kirshbaum's behalf, as well as with the Maine Human Rights Commission and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is a federal agency.

After 38 years with the station, Kirshbaum was terminated in May. She says she lost her job over her fears of returning to the office due to the COVID-19 outbreak. She had been working remotely since the beginning of April until May 18, when she was terminated.

A medical condition means Kirshbaum is more vulnerable if she gets COVID-19, and is at higher risk of it becoming fatal. In May, Chris Forgy, SVP of Operations at Saga, said Kirshbaum was not fired, but rather laid off after she rejected a lesser position to do her radio show from home at lesser pay. Forgy said Kirshbaum needed to be inside the building to perform her job adequately stating: "We need to have leadership in the building. You don't lead from a bedroom in your slippers."

In the complaints filed on Sunday, Kirshbaum said her termination was "explicitly based on my request to continue the reasonable accommodation of working remotely and my refusal to risk my life by returning to the office immediately."

She also claimed that her age and gender were contributing factors to her termination.