Alsip v. Charter Commc'ns, Inc.

JUDITH ALSIP, Plaintiff, v. CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS, INC., Defendant.

Civil Action No.: 19-cv-01350-MEH

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLORADO

August 31, 2020

ORDER

Michael E. Hegarty, United States Magistrate Judge.

Before the Court are Plaintiff's Motion for Partial Summary Judgment (ECF 37) and Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (ECF 38). Plaintiff Judith Alsip ("Alsip") initiated this lawsuit on May 10, 2019, then filed the operative Amended Complaint on January 8, 2020, alleging three claims for relief: (1) sex discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended ("Title VII"); (2) violation of the Equal Pay Act; and (3) retaliation in violation of Title VII. ECF 1, 29. Defendant Charter Communications, Inc. ("Charter") filed an Answer in response to the Complaint (ECF 32), then the parties proceeded with discovery. Alsip filed her motion on June 23, 2020 seeking summary judgment only as to Charter's liability for her retaliation claim, and Charter filed its motion on July 1, 2020, seeking summary judgment on all of Alsip's claims. The motions are fully briefed, no party seeks oral argument, and the Court finds further argument is unnecessary for adjudication of the parties' motions. For the following reasons, the Court will deny both motions.

FINDINGS OF FACT

The Court makes the following findings of fact viewed in the light most favorable to the non-moving party, depending on which party has the burden of proof. Unless otherwise cited, these facts are undisputed for purposes of the present motion.

1. Alsip began working for Time Warner Cable ("Time Warner") in 2004.

2. She worked in the digital phone space at Time Warner for approximately five years, and in 2009, she joined the engineering group as the Manager of Video-on-Demand ("VOD").

3. David Cherryholmes was Alsip's supervisor from 2013, when Alsip's title was changed to Engineer, until January 2019.

4. Alsip was an Engineer for approximately two years, until Cherryholmes promoted her to Senior Engineer and then, ultimately, to Manager in 2016.

5. Alsip received a nine percent salary increase in connection with her 2016 promotion.

6. Alsip considers Cherryholmes to have been a great manager and dedicated to his team, and she has great respect for his supervisor, Ken Sampson.

7. Cherryholmes had an excellent business relationship with Alsip; he relied on her heavily for six years, which is why he promoted her twice and tried to promote her a third time.

8. Starting in 2016, Time Warner Cable, Bright House Networks, and Charter/Spectrum were combined to form the current Charter Communications, Inc.

9. In connection with the merger of the three companies, Alsip was offered the opportunity to relocate to Denver, Colorado to Charter's "Center of Excellence." As indicated in the relocation offer, her title was going to change from "Manager, VOD Planning" to "Manager, Video Operations," and her salary was going to increase by twelve percent from $94,484.66 to $105,822.80 (with the same ten percent annual bonus).

10. In contrast, with respect to Cherryholmes' transfer to Denver, he received one offer letter, which contained both the request to move and the offer of promotion.

11. Alsip executed her Relocation Offer Letter before discussions began about reorganizing the team and potentially promoting Alsip to a Senior Manager.

12. Alsip's relocation letter did not reflect any promotion offer because "[w]hen Judith's letter was created, there wasn't the intention for her to be a senior manager. So it wasn't reflected in that letter."

13. As a result of the reorganization, Cherryholmes determined to seek a promotion of Alsip to Senior Manager effective upon her transfer to Denver in mid-2017, and Cherryholmes' supervisor, Sampson, approved Cherryholmes' request.

14. Cherryholmes' intention had been to place a Senior Manager over VOD just as there was a Senior Manager over Switched Digital Video ("SDV"). Thus, James Stinson was slated for the role of Senior Manager over SDV making $135,000, and Alsip was slated for the position of Senior Manager over VOD.

15. Alsip was a member of a team of eleven people and she was the only female on the team. All were verbally offered a promotion upon relocation to Denver, except Erik Patterson. All were promoted except Alsip and Patterson.

16. Cherryholmes, Charter's designee for Plaintiff's Rule 30(b)(6) deposition, testified that the relocation/promotion process was "unlike anything else" he had "dealt with"; with respect to Alsip, he stated that her situation was "unique" in that she was told in advance of her promotion but "her offer letter did not contain language announcing her title adjustment, her new role" and she was listed on proposed organizational charts as a senior manager. Rule 30(b)(6) Deposition of David Mark Cherryholmes ("Rule 30(b)(6) Dep.") 14: 4 - 15: 10.17. Alsip understood that the organizational chart circulated in late March 2017, reflecting her as a "Senior Manager," was a proposal as opposed to an actual structure in place. Alsip appeared on all proposed organizational charts as a senior manager from March 2017—September 2017.

18. Ultimately, as Alsip acknowledges, Sampson "simply overlooked some requests that he should have put in on Alsip's behalf," including a written promotion offer.

19. Sampson wanted to give Alsip the promotion and, therefore, he tried to correct the mistake.

20. Sampson submitted a Promotion Nomination Request on October 6, 2017 after he and his team, including Alsip, had relocated to Denver.

21. In the request, Sampson proposed a ten percent salary increase, which was considered to be high because "promotions usually came with only around a five percent increase."

22. Executive Vice President of Network Operations ("NetOps") Scott Weber must approve all promotion requests at Charter.

23. Weber denied Sampson's request because "there was a policy in place that for one year after relocating to Denver, you could not have a promotion or a salary adjustment unless it was baked into the process, itself, through that offer letter."

24. No Charter policy prevented Weber from fixing Sampson's "clerical error" of failing to "spin out a second offer letter." Rule 30(b)(6) Dep. 32: 8-11; 49: 3-12.

25. Alsip never met Weber and never had any direct communications with him of any sort.

26. Alsip was aware of only one deviation from Weber's rule, which was in connection with filling a vacancy, not with creating a new position, as was true in her circumstance.

27. Cherryholmes never promised Alsip that she would, in fact, be promoted; he never "promised an outcome," although he tried as hard as could to accomplish her promotion.

28. Sampson was very apologetic when he conveyed to Alsip that the promotion request had been denied.

29. While Cherryholmes agrees with Alsip that she was not treated fairly with respect to the promotion, he does not believe she was treated differently because she was a woman. Rather, he believes she was treated differently because "Ken Sampson forgot to spin out a second offer letter. We wouldn't be here if that happened."

30. Cherryholmes spoke with Sampson approximately twelve times in an attempt to correct the mistake and achieve Alsip's promotion.

31. Two female employees were promoted upon relocation.

32. At the time of the relocation to Denver, an employee who worked for Bright House Networks, David Erik Patterson, requested "several times" from Sampson a promotion upon relocation, but Sampson denied his request because "there was no promotion available." Hearing Tr., July 23, 2020, 4: 11-20, ECF 47. Patterson believed, but was not sure, that his supervisor, Mark Ogletree, sought a promotion for Patterson upon the relocation. Id., 5: 19-24. A Charter document dated on or about January 30, 2018 reflects Patterson's name on a list of "promotional recommendations." ECF 38-6, 39. The parties agree that Patterson's relocation was a lateral move.

33. Cherryholmes and Alsip also tried to arrange a promotion for another employee, Jim Bannister, but that request was denied because he had not been in Denver for a year. Deposition of Judith Alsip, June 1, 2020 ("Alsip Dep."), 98: 16 - 99: 6, ECF 38-1.

34. For a period of time, while Sampson's request for Alsip's promotion was making its way through the process, two managers reported to Alsip, Darrell Bynum and Phil Serrano ("direct reports"). Bynum began reporting to Alsip as early as June 2017.

35. During the period August 2017 through February 2018, Stinson and Alsip carried out the same roles for different teams. Rule 30(b)(6) Dep. 32: 14-20.

36. Stinson previously reported to Alsip, but at the time of the reorganization, he was promoted to a senior manager. His salary was $135,000 and Alsip was paid $109,526.

37. When Alsip's promotion was denied and it was clear that Cherryholmes' reorganization plan was not going to be adopted by Charter's executive management, Alsip's direct reports were removed in February 2018 and Cherryholmes became their manager.

38. Sampson told Alsip on January 15, 2018 that Charter was going to remove "on paper" her direct reports, but he asked Alsip to continue doing the same job. Sampson explained that "sometimes things on paper are not what they really are." Second Declaration of Judy Alsip, July 23, 2020 ("Alsip 2d Decl.") ¶ 4, ECF 46-1. Alsip testified that her duties and responsibilities did not change throughout 2018. Id.

39. While Cherryholmes continued to use Alsip in a project management capacity, such that she continued to focus the team as a whole and supervised the team (including Bynum and Serrano) on a daily basis, she no longer handled her direct reports' annual reviews and she had no hiring and firing authority over them. According to Cherryholmes, "in terms of what I needed out of [Alsip] and what I needed out of [Stinson], there was a lot of similarity even after the" direct reports were removed. Rule 30(b)(6) Dep. 30: 14 - 31:1.

40. Cherryholmes...