The Colorado Legal Initiatives Project (CLIP) announced that Kim Dower has successfully concluded her transgender employment discrimination case against retailer King Soopers, which is part of the Kroger family of stores. CLIP has notified the Denver Anti-Discrimination Office and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that Dower has withdrawn her administrative charges of discrimination. The company is now allowing her to dress in her chosen gender in the workplace for the first time.
Dower is a pharmacist employed at a King Soopers store in Denver. She filed the charges in July 2004 after King Soopers told her she would not be allowed into the workplace dressed as a woman. (Dower initially informed her supervisor in March 2004 that she wanted to begin dressing as a woman.) In March 2005, the Denver Anti-Discrimination Office issued an administrative finding, called a ‘determination of probable cause,’ that King Soopers unlawfully discriminated against Dower because she is a transsexual. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has not issued a ruling in the case.
CLIP cooperating attorney Betty Tsamis, who represented Dower pro bono in the case, expressed her relief that the office sided with Dower. Tsamis, a Chicago native, told Windy City Times that she and the rest of Dower’s legal team are ‘very pleased and [that] Kim is moving along with the transition process.’