Guys won't be joining Hooters Girls

Patrons of Hooters won't find mustachioed musclemen in sexy T-shirts and shorts asking for their order.

The restaurant chain known for its scantily clad waitresses agreed to pay $3.75-million to settle a sexual discrimination lawsuit brought by men turned down for jobs because of their gender.

The settlement allows Hooters to continue luring customers with an exclusively female staff of Hooters Girls. In return, the chain agreed to create three new front-of-the-house support jobs for each restaurant that will be filled without regard to gender. Previously men were hired only for kitchen work.

Among these new $8-an-hour positions will be a service bartender behind each Hooters' bar. But the agreement stipulates that these will be support people only. A Hooters Girl will still be there to hand over the drinks.

So women hoping for the same "vicarious sexual recreation" offered by Hooters Girls can forget it. There will be no Hooters Boys or male bartenders.

"Our business is on the female sex appeal side," Mike McNeil, a spokesman for the restaurant, said Tuesday.

"Over the years there have been lots of people who have suggested (offering some male sex appeal). Our answer is, if you think that's a good, economically viable idea, get your capital together and go ahead and do it," he said.

Under the agreement, signed earlier this month, the restaurant chain will set aside $2-million as compensation for seven men who were refused servers' jobs because of their gender. Lawyers will get an additional $1.75-million. The agreement is subject to U.S. District Court approval.

Steven Saltzman, an attorney for plaintiffs in the class-action lawsuit, said the plaintiffs were satisfied with the agreement. "For the first time, men will be eligible to work in front-of-the-house positions at Hooters," he said.

Meanwhile, Brenda Feis, attorney for Hooters of America Inc. and Hooters of Rockville, said the settlement implies no admission that there has been discrimination or any violation of the law.

"The Hooters Girl is alive and well and that person is essential to our business," Feis said. "This agreement allows us to move on."

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission investigated the discrimination complaint against Hooters for four years, then dropped it in 1996 saying it had more important cases to pursue. The EEOC did, however, suggest that the chain hire men for the jobs held by Hooters Girls.

The recommendation drew snickers and ridicule. The chain put on a mock advertising campaign featuring a burly, mustachioed man wearing a blonde wig, short shorts and stuffed shirt, with the slogan "Come on, Washington. Get a grip."

The private lawsuit settles a consolidation of legal action brought between 1994 and 1996 by seven men from Illinois and Maryland who argued that their failure to get jobs at Hooters was a violation of federal law.

The restaurant said its hiring practice conformed with the Civil Rights Act because the chain is "in the business of providing vicarious sexual recreation and female sexuality is a bona fide occupational qualification."

The original Hooters opened 14 years ago in Clearwater. The founders sold the concept and franchising rights to Atlanta-based Hooters of America. The Clearwater company, Hooters Inc., collects royalties on all restaurants.

Currently, there are 205 Hooters restaurants, including locations just opened in Tampa and Wisconsin. New outlets are set to open in Manhattan, Seattle and British Columbia.

_ Information from staff writer Kris Hundley and Times files was used in this report.