Trans workers on Long Island face bias, lack of acceptance on the job

Amidst a national political backdrop that has made the LGBTQ community — particularly transgender individuals — the target of hundreds of pieces of proposed legislation in Republican-controlled states, local advocates said Long Islanders in the community still face challenges in the workforce in more supportive states like New York.

Advocates and economists who research LGBTQ economic issues said that members of the community often face barriers to financial stability, including discrimination in the hiring process, greater job insecurity, and lower wages overall compared to their straight and cisgender counterparts in the labor force.

“LGBT people face greater challenges in the workplace,” said David Kilmnick, president of the LGBT Network, a local resource organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and gender non-conforming Long Islanders.

Kilmnick, who founded the Network 30 years ago, said despite wide public support for the community from local elected officials, political rhetoric at the national level creates bias that seeps into the workplace.

“There’s still a lot of stigma about being LGBT, especially with the legislation being driven by many state legislators [in other states] and by people running for president on the Republican side who are using being LGBTQ as a weapon,” he said. “Even though that may not be happening here in New York, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t impact us.”

Across the country in 2022, state lawmakers introduced more than 300 bills that would limit  LGBTQ rights and health care access, according to a report by the Center for American Progress, a progressive public policy organization. So far this year, more than 500 anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced and a record 70 have been enacted, according to the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ advocacy group.

 Along with heightened vitriol against LGBTQ Americans, comes greater social pressure for them to avoid potential confrontation or alienation, Kilmnick said.  

“It makes it harder for people to come out,” he said. “We’re still looking at half of LGBT people not being out at work, which signals a major issue.”

LGBTQ poverty, unemployment

The state does not have employment or economic data related to sexual orientation.  The few national data points available  paint a bleak financial picture for LGBTQ individuals.

An estimated 17% of LGBTQ adults lived in poverty in 2021, according to an analysis by UCLA’s Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Law and Public Policy.  That compares to 11.6% of the overall population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

An estimated 9% of LGBTQ adults aged 16 and older were unemployed in 2021, the institute found. In comparison, the overall jobless rate that year was 5.46%, according to Macrotrends, an investment research firm. 

Hard data is lacking,  said Christopher Carpenter, a health and labor economist at Vanderbilt University and founder and director of the private university’s LGBTQ+ Policy Lab. “Very few government surveys ask information on sexual orientation or gender identity.”

But  the data that is available “consistently shows labor market disadvantages experienced by gender and sexual minorities compared with heterosexual people," Carpenter said. 

The largest culprit behind financial and employment disparities comes down to discrimination, though it may look different here than in other parts of the country, observers said.  

Anti-LGBTQ sentiment

“What’s happening is more covert than overt,” said Devon Zappasodi, project director of Pride for Youth (PFY), a division of the Long Island Crisis Center.  “What we’re seeing in states like Florida is overt. We don’t have that in New York, but that doesn’t mean that anti-LGBT sentiment isn’t here on Long Island.

“We’re seeing it in the schools and it’s in the workplace,” he said.

Zappasodi said when he's interviewing job candidates for PFY and asks them why  they want to work there, most applicants mention wanting a supportive, open-minded workplace.

“What they say is 'I want to work at a place where I can be me,' ” Zappasodi said. “Where I don’t have to hide. Where I can use the name I want to use, where I can express myself freely.”

Kenny Queen, 24, of Copiague, as asylum seeker from El Salvador who fled LGBTQ persecution in her home country at 17, said her experiences as a transgender woman on the job have been rife with discrimination and a lack of acceptance.

For the last two years she’s worked at PFY helping connect other transgender Long Islanders with social services and health care resources, a job she finds fulfilling. But prior to her time at the nonprofit, she said she had to leave two different jobs over hurtful comments bordering on harassment.

While working at a local Dunkin Donuts in 2019, she said management was vocally in opposition to her gender expression, which created a toxic and unsupportive work environment. Queen was early in her transition and said the experience left her depressed.  

“I did my best but the manager, she was very transphobic,” Queen said. “She was telling me all the time ‘Oh, don’t put on acrylic nails, why are you doing that, the clients are looking at you.’”

Eventually, the hostility became too much, and she quit before landing a short stint at a local food processing plant in Farmingdale early in the pandemic.

She recalled arriving to a follow-up interview for an office job at the plant. She said the interview was going well until she had to show her ID and work permit, which showed her birth name. After that, the hiring manager became cold and the interview soured.

Although she was hired, when she showed up for work the following day, she was told she would be working on the factory floor where only men worked, as opposed to the office job she was initially offered. She quit less than two months later out of frustration.

In both cases, her status as an asylum-seeking immigrant made her fearful over reporting her treatment to others.

“As a trans woman, especially a Latina, it’s very hard to find a place where people can accept you,” she said.

Harassed over gender identity

Half of LGBTQ adults reported experiencing some form of workplace harassment or discrimination over the past year because of their sexual orientation, gender identity, or intersex status, according to a 2022 survey by the Center for American Progress.

Instances of discrimination reported by survey respondents included being fired, being denied a promotion, having work hours cut, or experiencing verbal, physical or sexual harassment.

“Much like other marginalized communities, folks who fall outside of the white, cisgender heteronormative demographic are always going to be up against obstacles,” said J. Egler, LGBTQI+ policy analyst for the Center for American Progress.  

“Even in places like New York or other liberal-leaning places, not everyone is going to feel safe or affirmed in their workplace,” said Egler, who identifies as nonbinary.

Jon Bell, an attorney with the Jon Bell Law Group in Syosset, said discriminatory comments in the workplace, while often unintentional, are an issue he sees a lot in his practice.

“That happens all the time and employers more often than not get away with it because the prospective employee is not in a position to compare how they’ve been treated,” said Bell, who represents LGBTQ clients in employment discrimination cases.  

“Discrimination definitely happens here on Long Island, and it happens here often,” he said. “The benefit of living here in New York, though, is we have some very strong protections.”

In 2019, the state's Human Rights Law was amended to add gender identity or expression as a protected category, making discrimination on that basis prohibited by labor law.

Discrimination complaints up

Bell said he is fielding more calls from Islanders in the LGBTQ community who believe they've experienced workplace discrimination or harassment. However, most aren't viable cases given how hard it can be to prove biased treatment without tangible evidence or witness testimony. 

“We are definitely getting more calls,” Bell said. “But I think that more LGBTQ people know their rights and are advocating for themselves. Knowledge is power.”

Drew Berge, 21, a Starbucks barista in Wantagh, said his  experiences as a bisexual and a transgender man in the workplace have varied from accepting to unsafe.

“When I was working my last job, also another coffee chain, I did not feel safe,” said Berge, who began his transition a little over a year ago.

“It was not a situation where I would have felt safe with any of my coworkers or employers, so I very much went by the name I went by when I was born,” he said. “I very much felt that if they found out…then I would have been in danger. That’s obviously not a pleasant feeling.”

By contrast, Berge said since starting at Starbucks in January 2022, his experience has been much better, and he feels supported by his coworkers. Though since the drive for unionization at Starbucks locations nationwide began at the end of 2021, Berge said the relationship between management and workers has grown tense. 

“Starbucks has made this really big name for itself as a public-facing queer-friendly company,” Berge said. “Because of that, it became a safe place for me to examine" my identity.

“It’s a very calming thing to have a work environment where the people you work with have your back,” he said.

But after his  store joined in on the ongoing push for unionization at Starbucks stores nationwide, Berge said the tone of interactions with management changed.

During a one-on-one conversation with his manager, Berge said he was told that a union contract might mean losing access to many employee benefits, including access to gender affirming health care coverage.

“I remember feeling so targeted and alienated,” Berge said. “A lot of their [ the company's] activism in terms of queer positivity is very performative.”

Proactive employers

At Broadridge Financial Solutions Inc., employees said the company began taking steps to be a more welcoming and inclusive environment for LGBTQ individuals years ago, having launched an employee resource group specifically for employees in the community.

BPride, Broadridge’s employee-led LGBTQ affinity group, was started over a decade ago and now has about 665  members across the Lake Success-based company's operations in six countries.

“We’re very committed to supporting our LGBTQ plus associates,” said Juan Garcia, senior client relationship manager at Broadridge and business analysis co-chair for BPride. “It’s not a trend for us. It’s the right thing to do.”

The group receives funding from Broadridge — along with the company’s other affinity groups — to be used at the group’s discretion. The group is given autonomy to give to charitable causes and participate in community events, and is in regular communication with top level executives.

Garcia, 34, a member of the LGBTQ community who’s worked at the firm for five years, said his previous employer  wasn’t invested in inclusion efforts and as a result he never felt at ease.

“We want to be our authentic selves, and I came from a place where I couldn’t be my authentic self," he said. “It was almost like you had to maintain another personality and keep that in the back of your head.”

And while the group provides support to LGBTQ workers, Garcia said it also gives corporate leadership an on-hand educational resource.

“We have had several educational seminars on how to use pronouns,” he said. “We want to educate not just the employees but also management and C-suite. They are educated on what’s currently going on and the proper way to do things.”

Some in the LGBTQ community, like Tamara Layne, 58, a field operations manager with Altice, have been pleasantly surprised by the reception they received from their employers and colleagues.

“Everybody knew me before I transitioned and I was already a supervisor,” said Layne, a transgender woman who began transitioning publicly in 2018.  “It did hit me as 'Oh crap, am I going to lose not just friends, but is my authority going to be challenged?' That definitely was a thought.”

Despite those initial fears, Layne said her experience being out in the workplace has been largely positive, something she credits to her company’s gender transition policies and educational outreach to employees on matters of diversity and inclusion.

“Everything has been positive, thankfully,” said Layne, who also runs a support group for other transgender and gender non-conforming Islanders for the LGBT Network as a volunteer.

Layne also serves as Altice’s representative on the LGBT Network’s volunteer workplace advisory council, which pushes for greater employer education on inclusion and diversity.

She said while she’s been treated well at work, she knows from her conversations with others on the Island, particularly transgender women, that anti-LGBTQ sentiments on the job are the norm for many.

“The good thing is that we have the legal recourse to push back and our legislators are not looking to demonize and marginalize us, which is definitely a plus,” she said. “But from a societal standpoint it’s still here.”