National News
Yakima County may alter rules regarding background checks of job seekers
February 16, 2015 posted by Steve Brownstein
Yakima County commissioners are reviewing whether to change county policies regarding background checks of job applicants following the arrest of an employee accused of forging nearly $8,000 worth of vouchers.
Information about which departments are required to go through background checks has been forwarded to commissioners for review, but no recommendation is included, said Linda Dixon, the county’s human resources director.
A criminal background check would have shown that Rene Prado had been convicted of two felonies — including forgery four years prior to being hired in 2006 as an office technician in the county’s drug court.
Prado, 35, has since resigned and was charged last week with one count of first-degree theft and four counts of identity theft.
After her arrest, county officials said no criminal background check was conducted because the county limits such reviews to avoid running afoul of federal anti-discrimination rules.
But officials at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunities Commission said nothing bars an employer from running criminal background checks of all applicants. However, there are guidelines on how the information can be used to prevent discrimination in hiring practices.
“You have to treat people of whatever category equally,” said Rudy Hurtado, a program analyst with the EEOC’s Seattle office.
Yakima County checks criminal backgrounds on applicants for positions in law enforcement, treasurer’s office and computer operations — jobs that the county can demonstrate a clear relationship between a criminal background and the job being sought, Dixon said.
When Prado was hired, the county was probably not conducting criminal background checks on applicants for jobs in the drug court, Dixon said.
Sometime after her hiring, the background checks were instituted in the drug court, Dixon said. Dixon said she was unsure exactly when those checks were started.
Using the information in background checks in determining whether to hire someone can be complicated.
Bill Tamayo, the EEOC’s regional attorney, said case law on how and when to use background information is still unsettled, but the EEOC has issued guidelines saying that criminal background information can only be used in hiring decisions when an employer can demonstrate that it directly affects business.
Several employers, including BMW and the Dollar General discount store chain, have been sued by the EEOC for using background checks that resulted in firing or not hiring certain minorities.
A blanket policy of hiring nobody with a criminal record, Hurtado said, may appear even-handed on the surface, but it actually excludes minorities disproportionately since they may be more likely to have a criminal record than whites.
But Hurtado said that does not mean an employer can’t run a background check on all applicants. The guidelines caution how the information can be used.
Instead, Hurtado said the background check should be one of several steps in evaluating an employee. If an employee has a conviction, he said the employer should then seek more information, such as the nature of the offense and how it relates to the job.
For instance, a convicted embezzler would not be considered for a cashier’s job, but conviction for underage drinking would not bar someone from the job.
Prado was sentenced to 30 days in jail in 2002 on charges of forgery and second-degree stolen-property possession, both felony offenses.
She is accused of forging 54 vouchers, which are given to drug-court clients who need help buying clothes or fueling their cars to make court-mandated appointments.
Yakima County sheriff’s detectives said Prado forged the vouchers between December and the end of January, when Prado’s supervisors spotted irregularities in the vouchers, such as names of recipients who were not in the program.
The vouchers were used at Kmart to purchase diapers and laundry detergent, officials said.
