We all Lose with Policies of Exclusion

As a faculty member at Kalamazoo Valley Community College (KVCC) who vehemently opposes the college’s new hiring policy, I would like to respond to comments made by KVCC’s Vice President of Human Resources in  “KVCC hiring rule: Smokers need not apply” (Kalamazoo Gazette, January 25), and address the ramifications of such a policy for the college and the community.

 In the article, the vice president claims that “Most people who are unhappy with the policy don’t tend to confront me.... They’ll sputter and talk to a friend, but they won’t necessarily talk to me.” She adds that those unhappy with the hiring policy were “just reacting off the cuff out of anger.”  I would argue that the responses from those who disagreed with the policy were, in fact, public, quite thoughtful, and well-reasoned.

 The new hiring policy was announced in a college-wide e-mail on December 10^th. The policy was developed and implemented without any discussion or input from faculty or staff.  Immediately after receiving the e-mail announcing the policy—and convincing myself it wasn’t simply an internet joke— I e-mailed the vice president questioning the policy’s legality (as many do on first hearing or reading about it). The vice president replied via e-mail that in Michigan the hiring policy was in fact legal, as smokers are not a protected group. (Twenty-eight states, not all of whom are tobacco states, do protect smokers’ rights.)

 Two days later, on December 12^th, the hiring policy was discussed at a college-wide meeting with the president. At this meeting a number of faculty and staff expressed their unhappiness and disagreement with the hiring policy. For example, I asked the president if the college’s standard for implementing new college policies was going to be what was “legal.”  I pointed out that slavery was once legal in this country, but that didn’t make it right. Her answer to my question was no. The meeting was collegial; no one sputtered; none of the questions asked of the president appeared “off the cuff,” and none of the questions asked of the president were said in anger.

Those who agree with the KVCC administration argue smokers are a health risk and that not hiring smokers will reduce insurance costs.  (The college’s health insurance is self-funded.) Many of those who support the hiring policy, including a number of faculty and staff at the college, think it doesn’t go far enough.  They argue that the entire campus should be smoke-free, a rather odd argument, considering the campus could be smoke-free and the college could still hire smokers. For example, the campus is alcohol-free, but (at least for now) the college hires administrators, faculty, and staff who consume alcohol.  

The most common argument in disagreement with the hiring policy was expressed in a Kalamazoo Gazette editorial (January 26). The editorial called the policy “too draconian” and offered the “slippery slope” argument of what is next: “Once we start down this road, just where do we draw the line?”  A thoughtful and important question that must be asked and answered.

Where do we draw the line?

What about alcohol consumption?  The Lancet, a well-respected British medical journal, recently published a study that found “alcohol causes almost as many deaths and disabilities as smoking or high blood pressure….” What about obesity? Or anorexia?  What about those who live with a smoker? Eat fast food? Where do we as a community, as a society, draw the line?

 What right does a public institution such as KVCC have to be involved in the private lives of its employees?  Clearly with the implementation of its new hiring policy KVCC has invaded the private lives of current part-time employees who would seek to be “transferred into any full time (sic) position at”  the college and of potential future employees. When it comes to activities that are legal (whether “protected” or not), KVCC or any other public institution has no right whatsoever.

On January 1, 2005, when KVCC implemented a personnel policy that placed money ahead of people; that said money is more important than human relationships; that made the private life of its employees its business, it seriously undermined the college’s stated mission and institutional values.

Just as important, KVCC is the community’s college. When a community endorses a policy of exclusion, and KVCC’s hiring policy is one of exclusion, history shows that we all lose.

Keith Kroll, a resident of Portage, has taught for nineteen years in the English Department at KVCC.  A nonsmoker, he lost his mother, a life-long smoker, to lung cancer.

submitted by e-mail to the Kalamazoo Gazette on 12 Feb 2005 for “Viewpoint”