Co-Workers, Friends Offer Support

Despite pleas from co-workers, friends and family at a St. Joseph County board of commissioners meeting, St. Joseph County (Mich.) dispatcher Tracy Monroe has been fired for being absent from work. In fact, Monroe also didn’t appear at the meeting, since she was with her 2 year-old daughter Marissa in New York City, where Marissa is receiving cancer treatments. Monroe had been off on 12 weeks of federally-allowed leave to take care of her daughter, and had requested trades, days off and other leave to “bridge” to Nov. 29th, when another 12 weeks of leave would become available to her. However, she couldn’t come up with enough leave, and the county didn’t offer any accommodation to her. During the commissioners meeting, seven people spoke on her behalf. However, since the issue wasn’t on the agenda, the commissioners took no action, but said they’d consider putting it on the next meeting’s agenda. A reporter noticed a new job notice posted on the county’s bulletin board. Read more (scroll past the huge photo) here.