An instructor at Port Authority’s Ross garage filed a federal lawsuit this week against the agency, claiming racial discrimination after she was suspended for a week for wearing a Black Lives Matter mask.

Monika Wheeler-Hanna, of Penn Hills, is also alleging harassment and retaliation. Her lawsuit is the second to challenge a uniform policy change by Port Authority that prohibits political speech. The first case, filed by the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 85, alleged that the policy violated union members’ constitutional rights to free speech and equal protection.

In January, U.S. District Judge J. Nicholas Ranjan ruled in favor of the union and declared Port Authority’s prohibition on Black Lives Matter masks to be unconstitutional. His ruling enjoined the agency from enforcing the mask policy. Port Authority appealed, and the matter is now scheduled for argument before the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Dec. 7.

A message left with a Port Authority spokesperson was not immediately returned.

In Tuesday’s lawsuit, Wheeler-Hanna said she has worked for Port Authority since 1998. She was promoted to instructor, considered to be a first-level supervisor, in 2014 after filing a separate discrimination charge for not being promoted based on race. According to the lawsuit, she is the only Black woman in her department of 24 instructors and has been subject to unwelcome comments and racial microaggressions throughout her employment. She also alleges favoritism toward white employees.

Wheeler-Hanna is a member of the union’s Black Caucus, which encourages Black employees to be involved in union activities. In April 2020, following the death of Breonna Taylor and both before and after the death of George Floyd, she began wearing a Black Lives Matter face mask.

However, on July 23, 2020, Port Authority amended its operator uniform policy, stating that “[b]uttons, stickers, jewelry and clothing (including masks or other face coverings) of a political or social protest nature are not permitted to be worn.”

“The amendment was made with the intent to oppress Ms. Wheeler-Hanna and other people of color,” the lawsuit said.

In the past, the complaint continued, Port Authority celebrated and endorsed a variety of other political messaging, including Pride month; women’s rights; unions and the American flag.

Six days after the passage of the uniform policy, Wheeler-Hanna’s supervisor texted her to ask if she was wearing a Black Lives Matter mask. He told her he’d been instructed by his boss, who is white, to tell her not to wear such a mask.

The lawsuit alleges that the order was racially motivated and intentional.

“They were made to harass Ms. Wheeler-Hanna by prohibiting her from standing up against racial prejudices and systemic violence,” the lawsuit said.

Less than a week later, a Black co-worker was sent home for wearing a Black Lives Matter mask, the lawsuit said. Wheeler-Hanna put on her mask in protest and was immediately sent home and suspended for a week.

She alleges in the lawsuit that the amended uniform policy only applied to operators, and that she was an instructor, whose responsibilities include teaching new operators how to drive and maintain their bus, qualifying employees on route changes and researching detours and consumer complaints.

The day after she was suspended, the uniform policy was amended retroactively to apply to dispatchers, route foremen and instructors. That, the plaintiff said, was done to attempt to validate the discipline she received.

Wheeler-Hanna notes in the lawsuit that Port Authority’s dress code is continually violated by women wearing stretch and yoga pants, boots and open-toed shoes, but that she is unaware of any disciplinary action ever having been taken against any white employees for uniform violations in her 22 years of employment.

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