Tempers flare in clash of cultures

AMARILLO -- What started as a petty dispute among employees in a tiny insurance agency has escalated into yet another Texas Panhandle clash of Anglo and Hispanic cultures, this one complete with a boycott threat, flying insults and bruised egos.

At issue is the recent termination of two clerical workers who refused to sign a pledge to refrain from speaking Spanish to each other in the office. The ensuing controversy ignited fresh debate about bilingualism in the workplace and about the limits employers can place on their workers' casual behavior.

The dispute arose in the same city that attracted national attention two years ago when a judge ordered a Hispanic mother to speak English to her child or risk losing custody. And it erupted in the same region still torn by a rural school district's refusal to allow the celebration of the May 5 Mexican holiday known as Cinco de Mayo. "We're at the point where we're going to quit saying `I'm sorry' for things that we don't have anything to be sorry about," said Jose Francisco Ruiz, president of the Amarillo chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). Whether the women were fired or quit is another bone of contention. The women insist they were fired on July 18 for refusing to sign the pledge, which stated, in part, "if you can't live with the rules here, draw your pay and make the rules at your next job." But on Friday, the Texas Workforce Commission formally denied their requests for unemployment compensation, ruling that the women had voluntarily quit "rather than comply with a reasonable request." Agency co-owners Pat and Linda Polk, who don't speak Spanish, said a third Spanish-speaking Hispanic employee agreed to the pledge, which they said was drafted after customers and an Anglo employee had complained about the "rudeness" of the two women's frequent conversations in Spanish. Polk said he laid down the law because Hernandez and Gonzales were speaking Spanish "for spite" about three-quarters of the work day, and the other Hispanic employee had informed him that most of the chat was personal. Gonzales said the exchanges were usually small-talk related to the business of insuring property, including cars, homes, mobile homes, boats and jet skis. "It was regular conversation. We would pull a file out and say `Que es esto?' -- `What's that?'" she said. "A majority of the Mexicanos spoke Spanish to us. I think they felt comfortable," Gonzales said, adding that about 90 percent of the clients were Hispanic. The Polks had no problem with their employees speaking Spanish to customers, but were bothered when they spoke Spanish to each other. Gonzales vehemently denied the owners' claims that she and Hernandez had repeatedly been asked to speak English so others wouldn't feel uneasy. "If they would have told us ahead of time that there was a problem or this girl is feeling uncomfortable, maybe it wouldn't have gone to this," Gonzales said. She said the owners and the lone Anglo employee had taken to secretive whispering to gossip, sometimes about the Hispanics, in their crowded, two-room office. "I never got upset about it. I never had a problem with that. I thought `Hey, that's their business,'" Gonzales said. Ruiz said the LULAC-supported boycott would begin Saturday with a door-to-door campaign to tell Hispanics in the neighborhood about the dispute and about other agencies that could handle their business. "If we're not worthy of our heritage, then you're not worthy of our dollar," said Ruiz, who spoke out against the judge's remarks to the mother and the Cinco de Mayo flap in the town of Memphis, Texas. Pat Polk blamed Ruiz, an employee at the Pantex nuclear weapons plant, for "making a mountain out of a mole hill" by convincing the women they were improperly discharged, prompting them to seek LULAC's intervention. "There are two sides to the story, but I don't like it to be us against those girls, or us against the Spanish people either," Pat Polk said. "We've been asked several times if this is a racial thing, and certainly it is not," he said. Though he faces a boycott, Polk said he is buoyed by wide-ranging community support. "We've had literally hundreds of supporting calls. You would be shocked at how many of those calls were from the Spanish people. They call and say `Hey, you're right.' We have people with common sense on our side," he said.

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