7.
eC Memorandum

of Transportation

Federal Highway
Administration

Subject: INFORMATION: Anti-Harassment Date:

Lettie ha beC An
From: Thémas Everett In Reply Refer To:

Executive Director HCR-10

To: Associate Administrators
Chief Counsel
Chief Financial Officer
Director, Innovative Program Delivery
Directors of Field Services
Federal Lands Highway Division Engineers
Director of Technical Services
Division Administrators
Assistant Division Administrators

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) supports the rights of all its employees to work
in an environment that is free from all forms of harassment. As the Executive Director, | am
committed to maintaining an environment that encourages and fosters respect for individual
values and appropriate conduct among all employees.

The FHWA must maintain an environment free from unlawful harassment. Harassment has no
place at FHWA, and the agency’s Anti-Harassment Process establishes parameters with the
goal of preventing and eliminating such conduct. Harassment prohibited includes but is not
limited to any verbal or physical conduct that is unwelcome, humiliating, or demonstrates
hostility or aversion toward a person based on race, color, religion, national origin, age (40 and
over), sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, or pregnancy), disability, genetic
information, or reprisal (retaliation) for prior Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) activity. It
is behavior that creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive work environment and interferes
with work performance or otherwise alters the terms and conditions of employment.
Harassment can occur not only by a supervisor to an employee, but by an employee toa
supervisor or by one coworker to another.

In addition to understanding what harassment is, it is also important to understand what it is
not. Harassment should be distinguished from management's legitimate efforts to supervise
their employee’s time, attendance, telework, conduct and work performance; negative feedback
or action from management on these topics, while sometimes unpleasant for the employee. is
not necessarily harassment. An occasional misunderstanding between employee because of
individual or group difference in how they communicate also is not necessarily harassment.


It is the responsibility of all employees to immediately report possible incidents of harassment
to one of the following: supervisor, management official, FHWA Anti-Harassment
Coordinator, HR’s Employee Relations Division, or the Internal EEO Program Manager.
Employees who make a good faith report of harassing conduct or who assist in any inquiry
regarding such a report are protected from retaliation, which is not tolerated at FHWA.
Reports of harassment are confidential to the extent possible without impeding an investigation
into such allegations.

The FHWA Office of Civil Rights is authorized to coordinate the investigation and remediation
of allegations of any type of harassment in or relating to the FHWA workplace, and to ensure
accountability of FHWA in addressing harassment. The individual bringing the allegation
against a FHWA employee may be another FHWA employee, a contractor, an employee of
FHWA partners (such as State DOT employees or other DOT modes), or an applicant for
employment. The allegation can be raised no matter whether the individual is subordinate to,
supervises, or is a peer or partner of the individual being accused. The process, including the
remedies available, will vary based on differences in the employee status of the individual
making the allegation and the individual accused of harassment. Based on the specific
parameters of our anti-harassment program, some allegations will not be eligible for this
process.

I encourage all FHWA employees to review the FHWA Anti-Harassment Process so that we
can all do our part in cultivating a work environment free of harassment, where every FHWA
employee can be fully engaged, respected and valued.

For further information about FHWA Anti-Harassment Process and for technical assistance,
contact the Office of Civil Rights:
e Pamela McCormick, Anti-Harassment Coordinator at 202-366-1607
(pamela.mecormick@dot.gov)
¢ Tanya Emam, Operations Team Leader at 202-366-3493 (tanya.emam@dot.gov)