Fitness Instructor Reaches Settlement with Jazzercise

San Francisco--Jennifer Portnick, a 240-pound, 5-foot-8 aerobic teacher, reached a settlement with Jazzercise Inc. on her complaint that she had been rejected by the company because of her size. Portnick filed her company with San Francisco's Human Rights Commission last September, invoking a municipal ordinance that bars discrimination on the basis of weight and height after Jazzercise rejected her as a franchisee because of her hefty appearance. Portnick, who has been doing Jazzercise for two years and takes aerobics classes six times a week, has dropped plans to become a Jazzercise franchisee. The company, however, has said that it will no longer require instructors to look trim. -New York Times