Kyle Dowie didn’t let life get him down. The mentally disabled man worked for 25 years at a grocery store, sorting returned bottles and cans—a job many people would consider dull or even dirty. But Dowie took pride in his work and got excellent performance reviews—until he was fired over a twenty cent bottle deposit.
Dowie made a point of retrieving discarded bottle deposit slips for customers—just in case they came back for them. A faithful bottle recycler himself, he was returning his own bottles for a cash-back pittance when someone noted that the deposit slip he presented was not his own. Store operations manager Curt Sills fired Dowie from his job of 25 years over 20 cents.
Dowie’s mother says that job, which paid $13 an hour, was Dowie’s lifeline.
DesMoines Register columnist Rekha Basu notes that the bottle deposit money isn’t even the store’s to begin with—it’s attached to the bottles. Tell Hy-Vee to rehire Dowie.I think this is an utterly despicable thing to do regardless of whether or not the employee is disabled, but people with disabilities are extremely vulnerable to unemployment, employment discrimination, and worker exploitation.
There’s more information here, and the case gets even worse — it seems that the store truly wanted Dowie out because he was paid $13 an hour with 4 weeks of vacation as a long-term employee, much more than the minimum wage they want to exploit their workers at. I’m angry as hell right now. Please sign the petition.
This is why you shop at Fareway, TJ or Wheatsfield