Court broadly interprets railworker retaliation statute

In an issue of first impression for any federal appellate court, the Second Circuit broadly interprets the Federal Railroad Safety Act, a law that protects rail workers from retaliation if they speak up about safety hazards.

The case is Ziparo v. CSX Transportation, Inc., issued on September 24. Plaintiff was responsible for using a tablet computer connected to the On-Board Work Order system (OBWO), which allowed them to record tasks as they were completed. These tasks included the placement of railroad cars. This was a work tool that was not mandated by law but allowed workers to more easily perform their duties. It also allowed management to monitor employee performance, such that supervisors got bonuses if their subordinates performed their duties more efficiently. With any eye on those bonuses, plaintiff's supervisors -- Lacy and Van Blarcom -- pressured him to fudge the numbers to inflate the performance metrics. This work environment caused plaintiff to suffer significant stress which, he claimed, made it more difficult to perform his duties and raised the risk of a train accident. After plaintiff complained about these pressure tactics, he was fired. 

Under the Federal Railroad Safety Act, “[a] railroad carrier . . . shall not discharge, demote, suspend, reprimand, or in any other way discriminate against an employee for . . . reporting, in good faith, a hazardous safety or security condition.” 49 U.S.C. § 20109(b)(1)(A). This case poses two questions: what is a "good faith" complaint, and what is a "hazardous safety or security condition"? The district court said the good faith element requires the plaintiff show he had a reasonable belief of a safety concern. That was an incorrect interpretation of the statute, the Court of Appeals (Lynch, Sack and Park) says.

"Good faith" means does not have an objective component, the Court says. It means the employee believed in good faith that she was reporting a safety hazard. A sincere belief (even if an objectively wrong belief). Had Congress wanted the statute to have an objective component, it would have required the plaintiff to "reasonably" believe he was reporting a safety hazard. 

So plaintiff clears the first hurdle in this appeal. What about the requirement that he allege a hazardous safety or security condition? The district court said that requires the plaintiff to report a physical condition that is within control of the rail carrier, like a bad engine or faulty tracks. That is not how the Court of Appeals sees it. The Court finds that "hazardous safety or security condition" includes plaintiff's complaint that his supervisors' demands that he alter the numbers in his computer left him unable to focus on his work and that communication between him and his coworker over these demands had deteriorated such that it created an unsafe work environment and, as a result, "something was going to happen." Summary judgment is thus reversed and the case is remanded for trial.