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F.I.R.E. calls for EEOC complaint against City
The Firefighter’s Institute for Racial Equality (F.I.R.E.) is seeking any African Americans, women or other minorities who competed in the most recent (May 2008) entry-level examination that was administered by the Department of Personnel for the St. Louis Fire Department.
Any candidates interested in being part of an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) complaint against the City of St. Louis should contact F.I.R.E. immediately.
“Whether you were eliminated for traffic violations (Driving While Black) or for being over 33 years old, you should be a part of this complaint,” said Addington Stewart, president of F.I.R.E.
“All applicants must come to our office (at 1020 N. Taylor Ave.) to review the complaint and sign the signature form to become a part of the complaint.”
He said the deadline is Nov. 13.
Stewart said these tests had a severe adverse impact against African Americans who competed. Of the first 100 applicants, he said, only 19 (19 percent) are African-American and 6 (6 percent) are other minorities, in a city that is more than 50 percent black. Furthermore, he said, there was only one woman who passed the exam.
Steward said Director of Personnel Richard Frank has the authority to address adverse impact as he did with the test he threw out administered by Fire Team Test Battery. The adverse impact on the examination administered by Personnel Decisions Research Institutes, Inc. (PDRI) is just as severe, Stewart said.
“This is the first examination administered since 1975 that has not been under any court-ordered consent decree or monitored by the federal courts. They have turned back the clock on African Americans to pre 1960’s,” Stewart said.
“The first recruit class hired from this list has only six African Americans and two other minorities out of 40 candidates, while 32 are white.”
F.I.R.E. claims the hiring of this class has had a severe economic impact on African Americans in this city. The starting salary for a probationary fire recruit is $35,361. The economic impact for the hiring of 40 recruits by the St. Louis Fire Department is as follows;
* 32 whites @ $35,361 is an economic impact of $1,131,552.
* 6 blacks @ 35,361 is an economic impact of $212,166.
* 2 Hispanics @ 35,361 is an economic impact of $70,722.
“The inclusion of blacks, women and other minorities is a matter of national security when we are talking about hiring the nation’s firefighters and emergency medical workers to respond to potential acts of terrorism, major disasters such as tornadoes, electrical blackouts, floods and emergency medical mass casualty incidents,” Stewart said.
“The testing system that the City of St. Louis Department of Personnel administered failed to give blacks, women or minorities the opportunity to succeed.”
Please contact F.I.R.E. at its office at 1020 N. Taylor Ave., St. Louis, MO 63113 to review the complaint and sign the acknowledgment form. For information, call (314) 652-7107 or visit www.f-i-r-e.org.
Stewart urged that concerned citizens respond by Thursday, Nov. 13.
Wards of Wahby
Before Ward Connerly came into Missouri with his anti-affirmative action agenda and then the Barack Obama campaign swept everyone up with its momentum, progressive Missouri Democrats were discussing a targeted reform of the state party’s moribund ward committee organization. There was a general feeling that business as usual n including racism, cronyism, nepotism and disenfranchisement n had been allowed to rot in the deepest levels of the party’s structure.
All of this is felt to be true of the Democratic Party in the city of St. Louis. In the city, the Central Committee chair is Brian Wahby. Wahby runs in the same small political clique as Mayor Francis G. Slay, who employs his wife, Robbyn Wahby, as educational liaison for nearly $100,000 a year.
It is Robbyn Wahby who is acting as the mayor’s paid mouthpiece in favor of school privatization and charter schools. And it is widely felt her husband does all manner of behind-the-scenes work for Slay Inc.
Enter Antonio D. French, publisher of Pub Def and longtime local political observer and operative. French ran for 21st Ward committeeman in the recent Democratic primary and beat entrenched incumbent Chink Washington. French ran on a reform agenda that matches the spirit of the reforms previously discussed on a statewide basis by Missouri progressives.
With French on the inside, Wahby will need to get a whole lot better at his game n or get a whole new game. That deep rot in the heart of the party structure is now coming to light.
“Several North Side committeepeople called me this week upset about Wahby’s handling of this election,” French reports. “Newspapers went out to each ward with the photos of the ward’s committeepeople on the front page next to statements supposedly from them. Some of the statements were completely made up by Wahby and his bunch, and none of us were allowed to proof them before they went to press.”
Adolphus Pruitt, president of the 4th Ward Organization, heard the same grievances
“Any committeperson, if quotes are published with their face attached to them and they are distributed to their constituent base as coming from them, they expect to see them before they come out,” Pruitt said.
“If it’s representing something they said directly, they expect a chance to preview it and sign off on it. I don’t think anyone wants see their name attached to something they supposedly said for very first time in print.”
Norma Leggett, 4th Ward committewoman, said the paper that Wahby mailed to constituents didn’t include her quotes or picture, though she had sent them to Wahby.
“This isn’t the first time,” she said of the oversight. “We’re not one of the important wards or important committeepeople.”
Power people
The November issue of St. Louis Magazine has its annual list of the area’s power players, 52 in all. Here are 10 black folks who made the list and where they are ranked:
4) David L. Steward, 9) Donald M. Suggs, 10) Charlie Dooley, 21) Wm. Lacy Clay, 27) Michael and Steven Roberts, 29) the Rev. James T. Morris, 43) Darlene Green, 49) Sherman George.
Given that no one could possibly assemble such a list without puzzling or aggravating everybody else, a few thoughts.
Where is Lewis Reed? The aldermanic president is the only member of the City’s all-powerful three-member Board of Estimate and Apportionment not to make this list. Why not?
His vote carries as much at weight as that of Mayor Slay (11) and Comptroller Green (43). Indeed, since Slay and Green frequently disagree, Reed is the swing vote on the board and as such can wield immense power. How much of that power he wields to benefit Slay is a subject of much speculation. Perhaps St. Louis Magazine places him in the mayor’s pocket and as such dismisses him.
Where is Mike Jones? Slay gets his “brain,” Jeff Rainford (14). Why doesn’t County Executive Dooley get his core advisor?
Where are Steve Stogel and Joyce Aboussie? Last we checked, they still had seats at the inside Slay power table.
Isn’t the one-man campaign finance committee Rex Sinquefield a little low at 26?
Won’t a Barack Obama victory make Lacy Clay look really low at 21?
And how about that picture of a pale Richard Callow (31). As stealth communications operative for Slay and any number of people doing business with the City (and his “girlfriend,” Deputy Mayor Barbara Geisman), Callow usually shuns the spotlight, like a possum who rummages for food in the garbage in the dark of the night.
Finally, how must Slay and Rainford feel to be ranked behind three black men?
That fact n and Callow’s slide down the power pole from 14 to 31 n suggests new St. Louis Magazine contributing editor Malcolm Gay will be no favorite friend of Slay, Inc. That is good news indeed.