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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on September 17, 2010 at 6:46pm

But the department said in a letter to the court it is choosing none of the alternatives because they all involved a race-based quota. Corporation Counsel head Michael Cardozo says that would be bad public policy.

Unfortunately the decision not to hire means more OT for those on the job already, which tends to lead to the gripes about budget issues, mainly OT costs. However, credit should be given to the FDNY to not accept a policy which promotes a race-based quota.

The judge's decision here has been hashed over several times on this and various fire sites, so I'm not going to comment about that, but to me, I think it would be hard to make a claim about bias and then offer alternatives which can be viewed as biased.

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Permalink Reply by Brian Dumser on September 17, 2010 at 11:27pm

Chicago has the same problem. I fail to see how skin color factors into the ability to pass a test. My F.D. (n of about 60 FF's) consists of male, female, black, white, hispanic & asian. I just don't see how it's possible to discriminate against one race or another with a written exam! What am I missing?

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 17, 2010 at 11:40pm

cultural (which includes racially) influences us to evalute situations differently

in a more simply manner - consider how growing up in the country leads you to make different decisions than if you grow up in the city... think of how a country fire fighter works differenltly than a city firefighter, such as country firefighters often have no hydrants

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Permalink Reply by Vic Silverfish on September 17, 2010 at 11:57pm

Heather - I agree, but when you are testing entrants to a city department, would you have a problem biasing towards city residents? If the plaintiffs can show that the test somehow favours white male applicants, then I think everyone here would be in favour of changing it. "More white guys pass than anyone else" is hardly evidence of bias. That is evidence of a false correlation.

20 years ago, affirmative action had a role to play here, maybe even a quota system when nothing else worked. Today, if you can show bias or discrimination, go for it, but overall I think these cases hurt minority applicants more than they help them. If you can't be bothered to study for the entrance exam: TS.

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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on September 18, 2010 at 12:13am

Heather, I took the test for FDNY (back in 2002) and IMO was the easiest written test I have ever taken. The test was very watered down and for the test to be declared "discrimitory" is quite a stretch.

Because the requirements for the job are 18, HS/GED, and DL, there can't be any FF specific questions, so all the questions stem from basic reading, writing, and math type of skills. Stuff that anyone in school should be able to grasp. The test starts with a picture you study for 5 minutes and the picture is taken away, and the first several questions are about the picture. There are reading scenarios, there is some math, some word association and so forth.

Basically it doesn't matter if you are from NYC or podunk nowhere, the test covers basic reading, writing, comprehension, and spelling skills anyone in a school learns. To say it is biased is a stretch, IMO....and I commend FDNY for not hiring vs using one of the race-based quota "alternatives" as suggested, which in themselves can be considered biased......do you see the irony?

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 12:27am

It is discrimination to ask my gender
" " my name
" " my age
" " my race

if my name is Heather Rene Rolland Brown - you can guess that I am French, Irish & German ++ this comes with a bias [remember NO IRISH NEED APPLY... remember NAZI Germany]

if my name is Shanekwa Obiohcha or Muhammed Kahlid - that comes with an image in your mind

if you want to know my gender - you make assumptions

... etc. that can start the ball rolling

that being said - i have not seen the test so John you are much more versed in this area - but I will look online to see if I can find specific sample questions to use for illustration as well

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 12:37am

http://firelaw.typepad.com/fire-law/2010/01/fdny-spanked-hard-for-r...

01/14/2010
FDNY Spanked Hard for Race Discrimination
A major decision in the FDNY race discrimination hiring case was delivered yesterday, January 13, 2010, and it’s impact is only now starting to sink in. In a 70 page ruling, Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis lambasted FDNY for ignoring statistical imbalance numbers for years, and continuing to use hiring policies and procedures that resulted in a workforce that was approximately 93% white male.

The lawsuit, filed in May, 2007, challenged two examinations administered in February, 1999 and December, 2002, as part of the hiring process. In July, 2009, Judge Garaufis ruled that the examinations were discriminatory under the disparate impact theory. The ruling yesterday was important because FDNY was also being accused of deliberate, purposeful discrimination. There are two basic types of discrimination, disparate treatment and disparate impact.

Disparate treatment is the most easily understood type of discrimination, but often the hardest to prove. It occurs when someone acts intentionally and deliberately to discriminate. For example, an employer who refuses to accept an application from a black applicant, or who purposefully destroys an application once filed, would be guilty of disparate treatment. Usually, disparate treatment cases are few and far between these days.

Disparate impact occurs when despite the fact that there is no clear evidence of intent to discriminate, a statistical imbalance exists that is evidence that some neutral appearing factor must be causing the imbalance, and thereby results in unlawful discrimination. The July, 2009 ruling determined that the 1999 and 2002 examinations had a discriminatory impact. The ruling yesterday was nothing short of historic in so far as it concluded that the continued use of such tests despite a longstanding knowledge that they had a disparate impact, constituted disparate treatment. In other words, the judge ruled that FDNY purposefully discriminated against minorities.

The city’s primary line of defense in the case was that the entrance examination, while possibly burdensome to minority applicants, was valid and justifiably rigorous as a business necessity. However, the court found:

· “the City could not demonstrate a correspondence between the tasks or work behaviors required of entry-level firefighters and the abilities that the examinations were meant to measure”,

· “the City failed to consult outside experts to construct appropriate test questions, and did not conduct sample testing on the questions it adopted”,

· “the examinations did not actually test for the job-related abilities they were intended to test for”,

· “the examinations failed to test for cognitive and noncognitive abilities that are important to the job, the cognitive abilities that were tested for were not the most important cognitive abilities for the job, and as a general matter, non-cognitive abilities were more important to the job than cognitive abilities”,

· “the examinations were written at an unnecessarily high reading level”, and

· “the chosen cutoff scores for the examinations did not bear any relationship to the necessary job qualifications”.

The court went on to state: “The undisputed facts also demonstrated that the rank-ordering procedure failed to distinguish between qualified and unqualified candidates because it relied on the faulty written examinations and produced significant differences in ranking based on statistically insignificant differences in test performance. … Moreover, the City could not show that an applicant’s ranking corresponded to future job performance.”

Even more concerning, the court looked back to a 1973 case brought by the Vulcan Society, where FDNY made very similar arguments that were rejected by the court, and the city was ordered to hire one minority for every three whites hired. That court order expired in 1977. In his decision yesterday, Judge Garaufis pointed out that the percentage of black FDNY firefighters was higher in 1973 when the court ordered the 1 for 3 hiring as a remedy to past disparate impact discrimination, than it is currently.

The city also attempted to use its recruitment efforts as a defense to discrimination claims. The court concluded “While laudable, these facts do not raise any doubts about the Intervenors’ proof. The issue in this case is not whether the City recruited enough black applicants, but whether the screening and ranking procedure that the City applied to those applicants was racially discriminatory.”

“In 1973, Judge Edward Weinfeld held that the City’s practice of using non-validated written examinations to screen and rank prospective firefighters was illegal because it had statistically and practically significant adverse effects on black applicants and was not justified by legitimate business necessities. ... In 2009, this court held that the City’s practice of using non-validated written examinations to screen and rank prospective firefighters was illegal because it had statistically and practically significant adverse effects on black applicants and was not justified by legitimate business necessities. … In the interim, the City cycled through six mayoral administrations and ten fire commissioners. The percentage of black firefighters in the FDNY, meanwhile, held steady at around 3%. In 2001, the FDNY had almost half as many black firefighters as it did in 1965, one year after the passage of Title VII.”

“The Vulcan Society opinion [from 1973] is not an inscrutable oracle. It clearly placed the City on notice that, at any given moment, the legality of its firefighter hiring policies was a matter of statistical record and the City’s test-validation efforts.”

“What the City has been persisting in for the 33 years since Judge Weinfeld’s injunction lapsed is not benign neglect, well-intentioned dithering, or, as the City puts it, “at worst a display of bureaucratic failure and of aspects of the test preparation ‘falling through the cracks.’” … It is unlawful discriminatory conduct, as previously defined by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and reaffirmed by the Second Circuit”.

About the only victory that can be claimed by the city, was the ruling that Mayor Bloomberg and Commissioner Scoppetta were dismissed from personal liability in the suit, as having qualified immunity. Nevertheless, the judge also admonished them in concluding that the “proof strongly indicates that Mayor Bloomberg and Commissioner Scoppetta were deliberately indifferent to the discriminatory effects of the City’s examination policies.”

After reading the decision, I was struck by how one sided the decision seemed. Sometimes decisions like this come down because the judges are pursuing a certain agenda, and sometimes its because the city has no case. In either event, the court did not decide on a remedy – but it seems inevitable at this point that some sort of dramatic remedy is in store. That phase in the case will play itself in the months ahead. And the appeals could drag on for years……..

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 12:48am

http://www.ny1.com/content/news_beats/law_enforcement/125614/city-r...

City Rejects Judge's Solutions In FDNY Discrimination Suit


The dispute over the New York City Fire Department's hiring practices took an interesting turn Friday, now that the city has rejected a federal judge's recommendations that would lead to the hiring of more blacks and Latinos. NY1's Michael Scotto filed the following report.

The New York City Fire Department will not be hiring any new firefighters for the foreseeable future, because the city's top lawyer has rejected all five hiring proposals recommended by a federal judge.

In a letter to that judge, Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo calls the recommendations race-based quotas that he believes are "illegal and unwise public policy."

"I want to make sure that if my kids are in that building, I want the best-trained, smartest firefighter that we can possibly have coming through that door," said Mayor Michael Bloomberg on his weekly radio show on Friday.

The city had until Friday to decide which recommendation it would adopt if it wanted to go forward with the hiring of more than 300 new firefighters, based on the results of an exam that, according to an August court ruling, discriminated against blacks and Latinos.

Bloomberg said the city has made efforts to recruit minorities and FDNY officials pointed out that the hiring list was the most diverse in its history, with 33 percent minority representation among the top scores.

The Vulcan Society, which filed the discrimination suit against the city, disagrees.

"For the mayor to just out-of-hand reject this is typical of his actions in terms of dealing with race in the fire department. He's buried his head in the sand," said former Vulcan Society President Paul Washington. "

The city says not hiring a new class will put a strain on a department that is already down about 260 firefighters.

It is expected that overtime costs will skyrocket for at least the next two years, the time it will take for the department to put together a new test and hire a new round of firefighters.

"You can spend a lot more money on overtime, which we don't have. You can close firehouses, which I don't want to do," said the mayor on Friday. "You could lay off people in other agencies to get the money to pay for the existing number of firefighters to do the job."

The city is also planning to appeal the judge's ruling.

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 12:54am

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/09/15/2010-09-15_quota_ala...


Quota alarm: Judge is forcing city to choose between race-based evils in FDNY hiring
Editorials

Wednesday, September 15th 2010, 4:00 AM

Related NewsEditorial: Burned by the judgeFDNY plan to hire 300 firefighters blocked by judgeJudge rips lawyers for failing to hand over documents in FDNY discrimination caseEditorial: Playing with fireHeat turned up on FDNY to pay for biasEditorial: Fairness at the FDNYBrooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis is about to burn the city, the Fire Department and thousands of qualified applicants who took the most recent FDNY exam in good faith.

Garaufis is moving toward imposing racial hiring quotas as a way to rectify perceived discrimination in the department's testing regimen. To do so would be needlessly and horribly divisive, as well as logic-defying.

On the one hand, Garaufis ruled the test invalid because some questions were badly drawn and minorities in general did not score as well as whites. Yet, he accepted the exam as a basis for hiring - while grafting the equivalent of quotas onto the results.

He gave the city horrid choices.

One would let the FDNY hire by picking at random from a pool of candidates that matched the racial and ethnic makeup of all the people who took the test. The pool would be composed of the 2,500 top scorers, with two exceptions: the lowest-ranked whites would be replaced by the highest-ranking minorities below the 2,500 cutoff.

Other plans blessed by the judge would use hard percentages - essentially, outright quotas - to circumvent test rankings for blacks and Hispanics.

In effect, Garaufis has ordered the city to pick its poison while refusing to acknowledge the advances made by the FDNY in boosting the department's minority representation by persuading blacks and Hispanics to take the test in larger numbers and helping job-seekers to prepare for it.

Particularly galling is that Garaufis ruled out allowing the city to eliminate the supposed worst questions and then recalculate the rankings - because doing that wouldn't produce a racial result he found acceptable. He is simply wrong.

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 12:59am

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/01/19/2010-01-19_fairness_...


Fairness at the FDNY: City needs to get the Fire Dept. admission test right once for all
Editorials

Tuesday, January 19th 2010, 4:00 AM
Related NewsQuota alarmEditorial: Burned by the judgeMayor: Fire Department should only hire the best candidatesFDNY plan to hire 300 firefighters blocked by judgeBloomy fights on to exclude retired fire captain's name from 9/11 memorialJudge rips lawyers for failing to hand over documents in FDNY discrimination caseThe evidence marshaled by Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis conclusively established that through 2007, the city's firefighter exam was poorly designed and had the effect of discriminating against blacks.

The judge also found that the city insisted for three decades on using a test that weeded out blacks, limiting them to roughly 3% of the FDNY. That persistence led Garaufis to conclude that mayor after mayor, commissioner after commissioner, had intentionally discriminated.

His reasoning, which he says is in line with federal law, goes as follows: All those officials intended to use a bad test, so all those officials intentionally discriminated. That may be the legal standard, but it is not the moral standard in that it implies a deliberate mind-set to exclude blacks.

That's wrong and unfair. What's correct is that the city incompetently and unfairly stuck to its guns on using an exam that, in the end, was indefensible. What's also correct is that many a black applicant was disadvantaged or done out, undeservedly, of a job.

The next step in this long-running court battle should be to work out a settlement with the claimants whose arguments were validated by Garaufis. Monetary compensation will be in order - but not the forced hirings of blacks over whites.

At the same time, Mayor Bloomberg and newly appointed Fire Commissioner Sal Cassano must continue recruitment and education efforts that tripled the percentage of blacks who made top grades on the most recent fire exam. And while they are at it, Bloomberg and Cassano must give fresh thought to whether this test, which was not part of the suit, passes muster. Let's get this right once and for all



Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/01/19/2010-01-19_fairness_...

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 1:25am

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/08/02/eveningnews/main6737773.s...

NEW YORK, Aug. 2, 2010

NYC Says FDNY Test Not Discriminatory
Federal Judge Appoints Special Master to Ensure Diversification; City Says it Will Appeal Court's Decision

By Jim Axelrod


CBS) The fire department in New York is one of the most respected in the world and the second largest after Tokyo's.

The FDNY has well over 11,000 firefighters and officers and their heroism on Sept. 11 and many other occasions is legendary. But a federal judge says something is missing in their ranks. Diversity.

A federal judge says New York City is resisting efforts to correct longstanding discrimination in its hiring practices of the FDNY. For many, the letters FDNY spell heroism. The judge says not when it comes to racial relations.

New York City fire captain Paul Washington has a big problem with his department.

Court Rules For Firefighters In Ricci Case

"This fire department has been all white, lily white, for almost 150 years now," he said. "It has to end."

Eight years ago the fire department was 92 percent white and only 2.8 percent black in a city that was 24 percent black, a disparity that remains largely unchanged, reports CBS News correspondent Jim Axelrod. A group of black firefighters sued.

"We're in a tough situation because the fire department on one hand is tremendously heroic and the whole world knows about its heroism. And on the other hand we have this singular embarrassment," said Suzanna Goldberg from Columbia Law School.

Last January a federal judge agreed, ruling the hiring test to become one of New York's bravest was not just discriminatory but illegal. He ordered the city to fix it.

"Blacks don't fare as well as whites on this test, probably due to the disparity of education," said Washington.

Now the judge says the city "has been dragging its feet" and he tightened the screws, appointing a special master to ensure New York does what big cities such as Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Boston and Miami did long ago when they were sued.

They now have much greater diversity. But FDNY deputy chief Paul Mannix doesn't think New York needs to follow their example.

When asked about how Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Boston corrected their racial imbalances, Mannix had a one word answer: "Quotas," he said.

When told that whatever the method is, it worked, he said, "By using quotas. And we are against quotas."

Miami in particular expanded recruitment by targeting young minorities still in public schools with high school EMT training classes. Today they have firefighters like Maurice Kemp to show for it. That's Chief Maurice Kemp, the department's first African-American in charge.

Kemp said, "Like all other major city departments, it doesn't come without a struggle. I mean, we have to be conscious of the fact that we need to be diverse."

Mannix thinks the current FDNY test focuses too much on producing a racially diverse department and not enough on identifying the strongest candidates regardless of race.

"You're asking me to make my job more dangerous to satisfy a social engineering experiment," said Mannix.

Mannix doesn't officially speak for the city but the fire department and the mayor both declined our request for an interview. In a statement, the city said, "The city disagrees with the court's findings that these tests were discriminatory and intends to appeal."

The city says next time it hires, the incoming class will be one-third minority but no firefighters have been hired in the last two years and currently there are no plans to do so.

"I find it shocking the fire department looks like it does today and the city is fighting the decision and threatening appeal rather than going ahead and giving the city the department it deserves," said Goldberg.

"I want to see black New Yorkers share in this job because, like I say, it's not a good job. It's a great job," said Washington.

The only thing Paul Washington wants to change about this "great" job is the way New York City decides who gets it.

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Permalink Reply by Fabulous Heather Days of Summer on September 18, 2010 at 2:12am

Here is some general info that I found which influences testing.

http://remember.org/guide/History.root.stereotypes.html


Stereotypes and Prejudices

Have students complete the following sentences, then break up into small groups to compare their answers and discuss if there is any prejudice and bigotry in their answers or in those of their classmates, as well as what factors (e.g., television, newspapers, friendships, attitudes of their parents) may have contributed to such prejudice:

a) All athletes are

b) People on welfare are all

c) He's a cheap

d) Drugs are used by virtually

e) All homosexuals are

f) All politicians are

g) All people with AIDS are

h) All people who sleep on grates are

i) All Christian Fundamentalists are

j) All male hairdressers are

k) All male ballet dancers are

l) All Jewish mothers are

m) All Harvard graduates are

n) All construction workers are

o) He's so dumb, he must be

p) He's so smart, he must be

q) He's quick-tempered, so he must be

r) He drinks like a fish, so he must be

s) He likes watermelon, and so does every


Write down characteristics of each of the following groups:

a) African-Americans

b) Jews

c) rich people

d) Japanese

e) Hispanics

f) athletes

g) obese people

h) homosexuals

i) politicians

j) men

k) women

l) Soviets

m) liberals

n) conservatives

o) Democrats

p) Republicans

q) teachers

r) cheerleaders


Research and compare the following U.S. Supreme Court cases:

Plessy vs. Ferguson (1895)

Korematsu vs. United States (1944)

Brown vs. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas (1954)

Frontiero vs. Richardson (1973)


Consider your attitudes and prejudices about:

vegetarians
people who wear dashikis (a usually brightly colored loose-fitting pullover garment)
students who wear yarmulkas (skullcaps)
students with punk-style haircuts
students who wear an Afro
students with "skinhead" haircuts
students who wear gold chains around their necks
students who carry large stereo radios
students with orange hair
boys who wear an earring
skateboard users

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Is there an "African-American" area of your community? A "white" area? Is there an area which is "restricted" to one race, religion, or national origin? What would the consequences be for someone of the "wrong" race, religion, or national origin to seek to reside in that area?
Have you ever been told not to venture through a certain neighborhood? Why would anyone suggest this? Is any of this based on prejudice? Are there stereotypes of the people in that neighborhood? Would those people feel safe venturing into your neighborhood? Why or why not?
Discuss Adolf Hitler's reported statement, "Who still tells nowadays of the extermination of the Armenians?" Does this statement have any validity today?
Discuss the following: "Genocide can never be eliminated because it is deeply rooted in human nature." Do you agree or disagree?
Why do some people join groups such as the KKK?
Discuss how prejudice and discrimination are not only harmful to the victim but also to those who practice them.
Is it possible to grow to adulthood without harboring at least some prejudice toward minorities?
What can you do to fight prejudice in your neighborhood or school?

EVALUATION

1. Define the following:

stereotype
scapegoat
discrimination
ghetto
propaganda
prejudice
genocide
demagogue

2. Give four examples of discriminatory practices against African-Americans in the United States.

3. Describe one process by which a stereotype is created.

4. Why were Asian-Americans isolated in camps during World War II by executive order of the President?

5. Describe a stereotyped character from a television show or movie. Discuss how accurate the stereotype is.

6.What was the significance of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown vs. Board of Education?

7. Name several strategies majorities have used to isolate minorities.

8. What were "Jim Crow" laws, and what purpose did they serve?

9. Why is Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday celebrated as a national holiday? What contributions did he make to the civil rights movement?

10. What is the origin of the term "scapegoat," and how is this term used today?

TEACHING STRATEGIES

Encourage students to share any personal experiences they may have had with racism, sexism, anti-Semitism, or other discrimination. If students are not quite comfortable about speaking about their individual experiences, permit them to talk about the prejudices of their friends, or about prejudicial attitudes they have seen on television or at the movies.
Survey class members about the roots of their family tree: what countries their ancestors came from, what period they arrived in this country, the purpose for which they emigrated, and the business or trade their ancestors had when they first arrived.
Have the students read the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Ask them to describe values inherent in these documents (e.g., freedom, liberty, justice, truth, equality) and ask them to discuss how prejudice, discrimination, and bigotry promote values which run counter to those of these documents.
Spend time discussing the biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., his "I Have a Dream" speech, and whether any progress has been made on the issues raised by the speech.

Obtain a copy of the Anti-Defamation League's "A World of Difference" Teacher/Student Study Guide which is designated as a full course of study to promote prejudice reduction. Information about this guide, which includes scores of exercises, readings, discussion questions, and a bibliography, can be obtained from the ADL (230 South Broad Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19102; 215-735-4267).
Listen to and discuss "The Sounds of Silence" (Simon & Garfunkel) and "Carefully Taught" (from South Pacific : Rogers & Hammerstein). Discuss silence, indifference, fear of new people and situations; how we may accept others' prejudices too easily and without thinking.
Listen to and discuss "Word Game," a song by Stephen Sills (this talks about the origins of prejudice and how it affects human behavior).
Read and discuss an excerpt from Sammy Davis, Jr.'s autobiography, I Ain't Sleepin' Nexta No Nigger!

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