“font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>John W. Davis, a 2004 “font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>graduate, has not been able to get a construction job within the same school district that taught him his trade.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Like 97 percent of his alma mater’s current population, Davis is African-American. In his junior and senior years, he attended North Tech High School. It’s one of two technical schools operated by the Special School District of St. Louis County, and 22 of the county’s public school districts send their sophomores, juniors and seniors to the tech schools.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>One reason Davis can’t get a job with the Hazelwood School District is because a Board of Education policy restricts the district to hiring workers from white-dominated apprentice programs for construction projects, said St. Louis NAACP President Adolphus Pruitt in a Feb. 13 letter of complaint to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights Attorney Linda White.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Of 16,000 regional participants in these apprenticeship programs in 2009, only about 500 were minorities and less than 100 were women, according to the U.S. Department of Labor Region 5 Office of the Employment and Training Administration.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Davis “font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>is not the only student who has graduated from the Hazelwood School District and attended North Tech, Pruitt said in the letter. Since 2002, 1,600 African-American students have graduated from the schools and several have been Hazelwood students, he said.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The letter detailed that the St. Louis NAACP has added the St. Louis County Special School District to a Dec. 15 complaint and investigation of discrimination in the Hazelwood School District’s apprenticeship policy. At a Dec. 13 meeting, Pruitt presented the NAACP’s original complaint to Hazelwood school board members and requested that the district stop all construction activity until it brings its contracting practices in line with federal civil rights laws.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“North Technical High School opened its doors in 1968 and claims to provide ‘cutting-edge’ technical and career training to high school students such as John Davis, one of its graduates,” Pruitt wrote.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The school’s mission is to create partnerships for student success, he said. Its purpose is to provide quality technical and academic education which prepares students for entry into post-secondary education and/or the workforce.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Davis “font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>has not benefited from the mission or purpose, Pruitt said.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>On average, only 2.45 percent of the graduating students of North Tech high school are entering a postsecondary (technical) institution, such as the apprenticeship programs.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“We offer this as further evidence that the majority of North Tech graduating students suffer a disparate impact from Hazelwood’s policy restricting hiring from union-operated postsecondary institutions only,” Pruitt wrote.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>African-Americans students make up about 73 percent of North Tech High School’s current population, according to enrollment data, and 70 percent of the Hazelwood School District’s current population.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The St. Louis American obtained a copy of the letter making allegations about the Special School District. Provided with a summary of the allegations, Nancy Ide, communications director of the district, said the district did not know anything about the letter and could not comment on its contents.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Also on Feb. 13, the NAACP sent a letter of complaint to U.S. Attorney Richard Callahan, stating that Hazelwood School District has engaged in racial discrimination and has violated Title VI as a recipient of federal funds.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The NAACP further alleged that the district has discriminated under the two primary theories of Title VI: intentional discrimination/disparate treatment and disparate impact/effects.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Pruitt pointed to Hazelwood school board member Mark J. Behlmann’s comments at a Jan. 17 board meeting regarding his preference of hiring union-trained apprentices.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Behlmann, who owns a construction company and has been on the board for 14 years, said, “The good thing about having the unions involved is that they have a federally-approved apprenticeship program that we know if we use a union contractor that the people who are coming to the job site are trained.”
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Based on Behlmann’s public statements, Pruitt said the NAACP is concerned that the district’s construction program activity violates the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. A RICO case requires a pattern of racketeering activity. “In this case, the pattern of racketeering activity is alleged to be organized acts of violating State statutes governing Project Labor Agreements, creating a union only work place, and affecting interstate commerce,” he states.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Provided with a summary of these allegations, the Hazelwood School District’s spokesperson Diana Gulotta responded to the American that the district has not received the letter.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“We further allege that the Hazelwood School District has formed a loose association-in-fact of individuals and groups as a pro-union network, united by a common ideological purpose of promoting union-only construction contracts,” Pruitt states in the letter to Callahan.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>In the letter to White in the U.S. Department of Education, Pruitt also points to Behlmann’s comments as reaffirming the NAACP’s position that Hazelwood’s policy was crafted to specifically ensure that only union-trained apprentices work on district projects.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“The Special School District working in partnership with the Hazelwood School District is either ignorant or complacent with respect to the discriminatory policy,” Pruitt wrote in the letter to White, “and due to board member Behlmann’s public statements, the Special School District may be criminally complacent in supporting a ‘union only’ policy.”