Sexual Harassment Rampant At Evanston Lakefront, Staff Warned

EVANSTON, IL — The City Council has scheduled a special meeting for Saturday evening to discuss allegations of rampant sexual harassment against women and girls working at Evanston's beaches.

The meeting comes in response to a radio report Friday that detailed the contents of a petition submitted to city staff last summer and includes anonymous accounts from several former lakefront employees, including a former lifeguard who alleges she was sexually assaulted by a manager at a party for beach staff.

The city manager's office issued a statement Friday afternoon in response to the report. It contends that city officials acted properly in response to the allegations.

City staff thanked the women for coming forward and expressed confidence that "the appropriate measures have been implemented to respond to the serious issues raised and to ensure a safe, healthy environment for all lakefront staff and visitors."

In July 2020, staff from the city's Parks, Recreational and Community Services Department and the Human Resources division met with a group of four "female seasonal employees" in response to their request to discuss work conditions at the lakefront, according to the statement.

At that meeting, the group provided the city with a petition they had authored. It demanded a public apology for "the blatant sexism, sexual harassment, assault, racism, and discrimination that occurs at the lakefront," including an admission that the city had placed minors "in oppressive, uncomfortable and dangerous situations and in close proximity with sexual predators," according to the WBEZ report.

The petition was reportedly signed by more than 50 female lifeguards and beach employees, with many of them anonymously annotating the petition with descriptions of misconduct they say they experienced or witnessed during their time working for the parks department on the lakefront.

The accounts portray a culture of harassment and abuse with supervisors and male employees systematically targeting younger women and girls for harassment and abuse. One woman interviewed by WBEZ said she had been sexually assaulted by a manager at a party. She told the station she did not report it at the time and only realized it had not been consensual after going through mandatory sexual assault and harassment training in college.

According to the city manager's office, none of the allegations in the petition identified any of the people alleged to have engaged in misconduct or gave a timeline for when it occurred.

City staff said they "strongly encouraged" the lakefront workers to provide specific accounts of the misconduct described in the petition and identify those responsible to a human resources representative, and to report criminal sexual assaults and abuse that occurred off-duty to the Evanston Police Department.

The city immediately held mandatory sexual harassment training that focused on the prohibition of sexual conduct and behavior involving minors and detailed the consequences of violating the city's prohibition on sexual harassment, according to the statement from the city manager's office. Staff also appointed someone to act as a liaison to the city's Human Resources Division.

One seasonal employee was not rehired "after further discussions with lakefront staff" — and he was the only person specifically named in any allegations, it said.

"The safety and well-being of City staff is paramount, and all employees deserve a healthy work environment where everyone feels respected. Anything less than that is unacceptable. The City of Evanston regrets that there were staff who experienced a work environment that did not meet this standard," it said. "Despite the City’s repeated efforts to attain the identity of those individuals alleged to have committed these violations to hold them accountable, the City was unable to identify specific individuals due to the anonymity of the complaints."

Following the initial petition and apology demand, a group of lakefront staff issued a list of seven demands for a safer workplace. It said senior city officials dismiss younger seasonal employees and "greet us with scrutiny" any time they visit the lakefront.

"We see our demands as reasonable recourse for the lack of action the City of Evanston is taking both in regards to protecting its staff from sexual harassment and the failure to promote the health and wellbeing for said staff. These actions, in tandem with reparations for the aforementioned staff, are required," it said.

The workers' list of demands included: hazard pay with free COVID-19 testing and masks, the presence of a permanent park ranger for protection from increased threats from the public, anti-bias and anti-harassment training, systems to protect employees from harassment, including an HR representative, pay raises for beach workers under 18, support and recognition from the city and an end to random drug testing.

According to the city manager's office, parks department staff held follow-up meetings with the four organizers of the petition drive. At one of those meetings, they agreed on a "collaborative plan ... to ensure safety and communication" for the rest of the 2020 season.

Parks department staff later invited the organizers to participate in preparations for the 2021 beach season and met again earlier this year, staff said.

"In February 2021, the Parks, Recreation and Community Services Department met with the four employees to share remedial and additional training that would be required of lakefront staff for the 2021 season," the city's statement said. "Also presented were updated policies dealing with the other concerns they had previously raised in 2020, including compensation, COVID-19 safety protocols, and issues with difficult beach patrons."

Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss, who took office in May, said he would be transparent with the public about when he learned about the allegations and what steps he took in response following a closed-door discussion with the City Council Saturday.

Biss said city officials are currently in the "investigation and accountability phase," and he has yet to determine if city staff responded appropriately to the extremely serious issues raised in the petition. He said he was grateful to the young women who brought the concerns forward, but he still has unanswered questions about the city's response.

"How much investigation did we do to uncover systemic and structural problems and enabled this culture?" Biss said. "What did we do to root all that out, irrespective of how many specific allegations were made with names attached?"

The City Council was never made aware of the complaints by beach employees, according to Ald. Cicely Fleming, 9th Ward.

"I will be asking for full staff accountability and terminations," Fleming said in a statement ahead of Saturday's meeting.

"As I’ve communicated previously, I (regrettably) do not have HR authority except for the city manager, however, I have an obligation to ensure that our staff have a safe workplace. That is not happening and for that I take responsibility; even if it’s a year late," she added. "I applaud the bravery of the staff who brought this issue to light and personally apologize that they’ve had to go to the press in search of validation and remedy."

• Lakefront Sexual Harassment Petition Not Shared By Staff, Evanston Mayor Says
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