As Walmart moves to phase out its familiar blue-vested"greeters'' at some 1,000 stores nationwide, workers with disabilities who fill many of those jobs say they're being ill-treated by a chain that styles itself as community-minded and inclusive.
Theresa Sours, an 81-year-old greeter with heart failure, said she desperately needs her Walmart job to help pay for her medicine and mortgage. Sours, of Stuart, Florida, who's worked for the chain for more than 18 years, said her manager told her they had no other openings suited to her ability. As word spread, first on social media and then in local and national news outlets, outraged customers began calling Walmart to complain. Tens of thousands of people signed petitions. Facebook groups sprang up with names like"Team Adam'' and"Save Lesley.'' A second-grade class in California wrote letters to Walmart's CEO on behalf of Adam Catlin, a greeter with a disability in Pennsylvania whose mother had written an impassioned Facebook post about his plight.
"What am I going to do, just sit here on my butt all day in this house? That's all I'm going to do?'' Combs asked his sister and guardian, Rachel Wasser."I do my job. I didn't do anything wrong.''