More former employees of Chattanooga Neighborhood Enterprises may join a lawsuit claiming sexual harrassment at the agency.
That's according to the attorney representing eight people who are already named in the suits.
But, CNE has already successfully defended itself against similar complaints from employees.
AMELIA ROBERTS, ATTORNEY FOR FORMER EMPLOYEES " That's going to be for a judge and a jury to decide but I'm seeing a lot of smoke."
Chattanooga Neighborhood Enterprises is a non-profit agency of city government charged with helping Chattanooga residents find and buy affordable homes.
It seeks to provide loans at below market rate.
In 2007, the CNE staff was reduced from 54 employees to 20.
David Johnson took over in 2008, and that's when most of the complaints charging sexual harrassment began.
AMELIA ROBERTS "With regard to the cases that have been filed so far, these are under tennessee law...these are whistle-blower cases."
CEO David Johnson and others at CNE were not available to comment on the complaints, but spokesman Albert Waterhouse issued the following statement on Wednesday.
" CNE has successfully defended five previous EEOC complaints in the past three years, including a previous allegation of sexual harassment. Each of the complaints received "no cause" determinations and were dismissed by the EEOC. Similarly, there is absolutely no basis in fact regarding these allegations and we are completely confident that with further review a court of law will also find these false and misleading charges are without merit."
AMELIA ROBERTS " In addition to discrimination, what happened was that when these employees complained about discrimination, instead of having their claims taken seriously and investigated...these employees were retaliated against, persecuted and dismissed."
Ms. Roberts says several cases are still being investigated by the EEOC.
Roberts says the "Whistle-Blower" complaints came from employees who say they were fired after reported financial discrepancies.
