Bridgeport firefighters claim reverse discrimination

unreal wrote:

Tim,
You don't actually expect him to apologize to you do you? He will never admit he is wrong. It is entrenched in his beliefs that nothing is ever his fault and he is not held accountable for his actions. People like him will never change. They will never tell you how they really feel because it will hurt their "cause". If you read this blog you will see he ducked and dodged his way through, never answering the tough questions. He is a man with no opinion, he quotes people like Tim Wise because he does not have the intelligence to form his own opinions and arguments. Why do you think it is so important for him to identify me? Maybe so he could attack me personally? Thats what people like him resort to in the end.
Just hope you aren't holding your breath Tim, we both know better

unreal,

I may have disagreed with Ron about his politics, but it was always in a mutualy respectful way. Should the circumstances be reversed, I know that I would offer an apology. That is what gentlemen are expected to do.

Tim Richmond wrote:

<quoted text>
unreal,
I may have disagreed with Ron about his politics, but it was always in a mutualy respectful way. Should the circumstances be reversed, I know that I would offer an apology. That is what gentlemen are expected to do.

Tim Richmond, if I made a mistake in saying that it was you who was making those racist comments about myself, former Firebird Society President & Retired Captain Donald Day, former Firebird Society President & the current President of the Bridgeport chapter of the NAACP, Retired Lieutenant Craig Kelly and the Firebird Society of Bridgeport, CT as an organization, then I apologize. But let me make this clear to you Tim and anybody reading this, we can disagree on issues but when someone makes racist statements the way certain persons did on this blog then they better "MAN UP," that`s why they don`t give their real name.

Tim, I have never had a problem talking to you about anything, in fact we just spoke a week ago, in fact I have never had a problem talking to any white Bridgeport firefighter because they though that I had an opinion on an issue and they sought my opinion.

I have attempted to give an opinion of how I look (as a blackman) at the law and the issues on testing and I would follow that with what others have publish or that law itself.

For me, this is not so much about this particular test, but the circumstances behind it. The first judge sided with those that wanted to discount the first examination on the grounds it was unfair to the blacks. The implication was that blacks are not capable of being as competitive with exams regarding writing and reading. This is absurd!, blacks are every bit as capable of reading and writing as their white counterparts, Rules, courts, laws, judges, etc. like this are what add fuel to the race tensions in our society. No one should be aided or discounted based upon the color of their skin period! I hope all of those who did not do as well as they wished on the test, study harder and pass the test the next time the opportunity is available, and I congratulate those that passed the test this time.

Well was the racist comments directed at me?? Please point them out, I'd love to know what I have said that is "racist". I preach equality, education and training. You think whites should go through slavery. I believe we are one race, the human race.
I don't now or have I ever judged by color, sex, or religion. I judge on personnal character. I assure you anything that I have said here has nothing to do with race and everything to do with a persons character. I do not believe ANYONE should use there race to obtain an advantage over anyone. And as I have said before, as a nation, we will never ne truly equal while one race or another gets special treatment. Those are my beliefs as a white man....

Ron Mackey wrote:

<quoted text>
Tim Richmond, if I made a mistake in saying that it was you who was making those racist comments about myself, former Firebird Society President & Retired Captain Donald Day, former Firebird Society President & the current President of the Bridgeport chapter of the NAACP, Retired Lieutenant Craig Kelly and the Firebird Society of Bridgeport, CT as an organization, then I apologize. But let me make this clear to you Tim and anybody reading this, we can disagree on issues but when someone makes racist statements the way certain persons did on this blog then they better "MAN UP," that`s why they don`t give their real name.
Tim, I have never had a problem talking to you about anything, in fact we just spoke a week ago, in fact I have never had a problem talking to any white Bridgeport firefighter because they though that I had an opinion on an issue and they sought my opinion.
I have attempted to give an opinion of how I look (as a blackman) at the law and the issues on testing and I would follow that with what others have publish or that law itself.

Ron,

Apology accepted. As I said, you and I have not always agreed on things, but we have always been respectful of each other.

you can't blame people for being sensitive to reverse discrimination, if it's purposely designed that way by higher powers.
But if it is happening as a naturally occurring event then those who are victims should try to understand how minorities have felt for decades.
time to break down the color and look at the person for who she/he is.

"time to break down the color and look at the person for who she/he is."

well said applepie, a man/woman should be judged by the content of his/her character not the color of there skin.

Equal rights are for EVERYBODY

the real problem is bpt fire fighters think they run the the dept i been on the dept fo 2yr and never been on a job where race is 95 percent of the converstion.ron has no reson to say i am sorry .....

NEW YORK TIMES July 24, 2009
Racial Bias in Fire Exams Can Lurk in the Details

By DIANE CARDWELL Part 1
When a Federal District Court judge in Brooklyn ruled Wednesday that New York City had discriminated against black and Hispanic applicants to the Fire Department, he argued that two entrance exams, used in 1999 and 2002, adversely affected minorities and had little relation to firefighting.

On the surface, the tests — versions of which remained in use until 2007, according to the court — do not appear racially biased. Each exam consists of 85 multiple-choice questions about firefighting practices: the order in which a firefighter should don gear in an alarm; what the rear of a building would look like, based on its facade; the right situations in which to say “mayday” rather than “urgent” over the walkie-talkie.

But a closer look shows that the exams also required applicants to read and understand long passages, often containing technical terms, and then answer questions about them. One question, for instance, follows a 250-word description of the use and maintenance of portable power saws and asks which type of blade must be put out of service.

The choices: A) A carbide tip blade missing nine tips; B) a carbide tip blade with three broken tips; C) an aluminum oxide blade measuring 12 inches; D) a yellow silicon carbide blade measuring nine inches.(The correct answer is A).

In big cities across the country, firefighter entrance exams have tended to favor applicants already steeped in the ways of the job, like “people whose dads and uncles are firefighters,” said Richard Primus, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Michigan. That, he said, has perpetuated the disproportionate representation of whites in those firefighting forces.

Besides, Professor Primus added, some of that knowledge is not needed to become a good firefighter.“Much of what appears on written exams for firefighters is legitimately material that we should want firefighters to know,” he said, but some of it tends to be knowledge that “firefighting junkies have, even though it is not really necessary for fighting fires.”

At issue in the New York case, legal experts said, was not so much whether the exams themselves were biased. Rather, the law requires that if a test has the effect of disproportionately excluding minorities, then the skills it measures must be necessary to the job — a standard that the judge, Nicholas G. Garaufis, found the city did not meet.

Ruling in a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department in 2007, Judge Garaufis wrote that in creating the test, the city convened a panel of firefighters who identified 21 “task clusters” to be tested, like evaluating a fire scene or searching for victims, and 18 “abilities,” like memorization, deductive reasoning and spatial orientation.

Part 2 NEW YORK TIMES

The panel determined that only half of the abilities could be tested in a multiple choice format, the judge wrote, and two abilities that the panel ranked as most important — oral comprehension and oral expression — were omitted because it was not feasible to conduct interviews with thousands of applicants.

Later, in depositions, panel members showed “a considerable degree of confusion about the process and about the definitions of abilities the members were supposed to evaluate,” the judge wrote. One member said he “probably didn’t know” what inductive reasoning meant when he rated its importance to the job.

Saying that the city had demonstrated “only a minimal relationship between the content of its examinations and the content of the job of firefighter,” Judge Garaufis wrote:“These serious failings culminated in the city’s decision to use the problem-riddled examinations to impermissibly fail and arbitrarily rank firefighter candidates.”

City officials, while fighting the lawsuit, have rewritten the exam, reducing the amount of reading, using more visual elements like photos and drawings, increasing the number of questions to 100 and testing for more skills like adaptability and establishing and maintaining relationships. That test was administered in 2007, and the city is still hiring firefighters from among those who passed.

The city cannot make the test public, said Connie Pankratz, a spokeswoman for the city’s Law Department, because people who were unable to take it because of military service might have a right to take it when they returned.

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

malcom x wrote:

the real problem is bpt fire fighters think they run the the dept i been on the dept fo 2yr and never been on a job where race is 95 percent of the converstion.ron has no reson to say i am sorry .....

Malcom X,

You misunderstand the whole point. What happened between Ron and I was a disagreement between gentlemen (something you as a 2 year rookie, and probably not of our generation, would not understand). This is America my friend, and if you have something to say or a cause to defend, you have a right to say it. Ron made a misjudgement and corrected it. That was the right thing to do. He did NOTHING to weaken his beliefs. I respect his actions as a man, and I believe that he would expect the same from me.

ok u got ur apology is there anything else u would like to say? i'm not a 2yr rookie and i know what goes on in the bfd it is the most racist job in the world second only to the kkk head quarters! everything is about race!!!! so please stop with ur
"i know it all" attitude TIM RICHMOND!!!!!!!!!!

unreal wrote:

Well was the racist comments directed at me?? Please point them out, I'd love to know what I have said that is "racist". I preach equality, education and training. You think whites should go through slavery. I believe we are one race, the human race.
I don't now or have I ever judged by color, sex, or religion. I judge on personnal character. I assure you anything that I have said here has nothing to do with race and everything to do with a persons character. I do not believe ANYONE should use there race to obtain an advantage over anyone. And as I have said before, as a nation, we will never ne truly equal while one race or another gets special treatment. Those are my beliefs as a white man....

Your comments sound pretty racist to me, your comments about people trying to make whites become slaves is ignorant racist and stupid. And BTW Jethro I happen to be white. The Bridgeport Fire and Police Departments have had problems with racism with the police Department finally getting past it while the Fire Department seems to still mired in it!

Nuke the Nazis wrote:

<quoted text>
Your comments sound pretty racist to me, your comments about people trying to make whites become slaves is ignorant racist and stupid. And BTW Jethro I happen to be white. The Bridgeport Fire and Police Departments have had problems with racism with the police Department finally getting past it while the Fire Department seems to still mired in it!

You are absolutely right, that comment about whites becoming slaves was ignorant and racist....and made by Mr Mackey earlier In this blog. So before you spew your verbal vomit get your facts straight.

PS I could care less what color you are... An idiot is an idiot white, black, yellow or green

Ron,
you may find this surprising but I agree with the FDNY ruling. I feel an entry level firefighter exam should measure the ability of a candidate to learn the job of a firefighter. Especially in a culturally diverse municipality. Not everyone has an opportunity to volunteer in there hometown or go take FF classes without affiliation with a department. I feel citys should offer high school programs, adult education programs, and cadet programs to introduce this profession to those who have no exposure.
I also feel the sheer numbers of FDNY's situation plays a huge role In the results.
Example: 12000 whites, 3000 blacks, 3000 Hispanics take a test. The city hires the top 10%. that gets you twice as many whites as minorities. For every 4 whites you get 1 black and 1 Hispanic makes it tougher to diversify. But it looks like the city is trying with the 2007 exams.
Now on the flip side of all this, standards should never be lowered. This is a life and death job. And any flexability in testing goes out the window for promotions, you know it or you don't. Same entry level test, same academy, same on the job experience. I don't want to hear excuses.

there's no such thing as reverse racism ....racism is to discriminate against someone on the basis of their race...and that PRECISELY what happened here. As a minority I wish people would stop coming up with ridiculous claims and excuses, how the hell is a test biased? I'm a minority and I do great in standardized tests, was high honors throughout my academic career and hold 2 degrees. The job should go to the most qualified individual regardless of race or gender, correct me if I'm wrong but isn't THAT equality?

Donald Day had this posted:

#49
Apr 26, 2009

Let me set the record straight for you people that seem to think you know anything about me or this case.

There are testing experts that would attest to the fact that an exam can be clearly invalid depending on what is on the test, the test preparers ability to create an exam that is fair, the relative weight of the exam, the composition of the exam and a myriad of intangibles that were are being used by some testing companies to exclude people of color as well as those that include people of color.

Those individuals that are suing the city should want the same thing as us, an exam that fairly measures all the qualities that it takes to be an officer. Candidates of color have done equally well on exams that are completely fair, like Blacks have done in cities across America. These individuals talk like Blacks didn’t study long, hard and with purpose. They talk like the Blacks didn’t buy the bibliographies’ and didn’t take time from their families and from activities that they enjoy to pursue this career opportunity. The fact is that Blacks did study for years for this opportunity and had they received a fair and impartial exam, they too would have done well.

Courts have ruled lawyers have litigated and experts have testified that an exam can be skewed to favor one ethnicity over another and that if all things were equal; Blacks and Latinos do as well on those exams as their white counterparts and make outstanding officers.

Someone said in these comments that they want the best qualified person coming to their home should it be on fire. Everyone does, but they fact that these individuals passed this exam doesn’t mean that you have the best. It simply means that they scored the highest on an exam that failed miserably to get the best from a group of individuals that took an invalid exam. Finally someone also said would you want a doctor that was given a license that was awarded to an individual that didn’t pass the highest. The question is would you want a doctor to operate on you that passed the written part of his exam with a 100% and got a 50% on the practical exam. Would you want a doctor that couldn’t use a scalpel effectively when you or your child needed surgery? You want your doctor to be a well rounded individual that was equally effective at both the written and the practical.

That’s what the Bridgeport and the New Haven test did, gave considerable more weight to the written part of the exam than practicable part of the exam. So what you have is a list that is made up of individuals that are book smart, but lack job knowledge. In closing, let me ask, if your house was on fire who would you want to come to your house, a lieutenant that know the chemical compound of plastic or one that knows what he would do if he went to a fire in an occupied structure with fire showing on the second floor on the A side with exposures on the B and D side of this structure? As a career fire fighter I can attest that some of the worst officers that any fire fighter has ever worked for are one that was book smart all while you knew he didn’t want or belong inside a working job.

Finally, what are you whites so afraid of when it comes to competing with fire fighters of color on an exam that truly measures the qualities that it takes to be an officer? Why do you want the written scored higher than a practical when you know that the practical separates the weak from the strong? The fact is that Blacks and Latinos do considerable better on the practical part of an exam and that the International Association of Fire Chiefs are advocating getting rid of all written exams for promotion and going to an Assessment type exam in its’ entirety. But I guess you assholes no more than the IAFC as well.

What about Chicago, where minorities sued over promotional exams that were "the saving grace if fair testing".... The beloved assessment center????

ARTHUR L. LEWIS, JR., et al., Plaintiffs v.Case No. 98 C 5596 CITY OF CHICAGO,) Defendant
JOAN B. GOTTSCHALL United States District Judge DATED: March 22, 2005

However, Joyce’s assumption was not correct and his decision to set the cut-off score at 89
did not account for the statistical properties of the 1995 Test. Dr. Outtz testified that, based on his statistical analysis of the 1995 Test, he initially recommended that the City set the cut-off score by counting down from the top score of 98 in 13-point increments. He arrived at his 13-point band by calculating the “standard error of the difference,” an index measuring the extent to which a difference in scores is statistically significant or due to chance, based on the internal “reliability” of the 1995 Test. The reliability of a test refers to the extent to which scores are free from random error, i.e., the extent to which retesting of a given applicant is expected to yield a consistent result. Since retesting was not an available option, Dr. Outtz instead calculated reliability by comparing the consistency of answers given to different questions on the 1995 Test by the individual applicants who took it. By Dr. Outtz’s calculations, the 1995 Test had a reliability coefficient of .77, meaning that approximately 23% of the variance in individual scores was due to random error.

Based on that calculation, Dr. Outtz determined that there is no statistical difference between any two scores from the 1995 Test that are within 13-points of each other, i.e., a score of 98 cannot 3 For example, according to Dr. Outtz’s testimony, a cut-off score of 85 would be somewhat defensible as it would “capture” all of the scores that are indistinguishable from the top score of 98. Although there would be no way to differentiate candidates within the 13-point range, there would be a basis for claiming that an individual who scored 98 has greater tested skills than an individual who scored 84.

-9-

be meaningfully distinguished from a score of 85. Given the statistical properties of the 1995 Test, Dr. Outtz concluded that there was a “psychometric basis”– a basis rooted in cognitive analysis – for setting the cut score using that 13-point band. As he explained,“[T]here is a psychometric basis for saying, for reaching the inference that the people who are within the band that I had determined ... have more of the abilities measured by the test than people outside the band.”3 Dr. Outtz also testified, however, that there was no psychometric basis for setting the cut score at any point within the 13-point band. In other words, in Dr. Outtz’s opinion, a score of 89 could not be statistically distinguished from a score of 87 or 88, two lower scores within the 13-point range below the top score of 98. Because the standard error of the difference was so large, Dr. Outtz discussed with the City the possibility of randomly selecting candidates from the pool of applicants who passed
the 1995 Test with a score of 65.

Despite Dr. Outtz’s conclusion that the 1995 Test could not distinguish between scores
within 13 points of each other, the City decided to set the cut score at 89, only 11 points below the highest score. Joyce testified that he made the decision to hire only those applicants scoring 89 and above:{{(a) against Dr. Outtz’s recommendation: and (b) with full awareness of the 1995 Test’s disparate impact on African-Americans generally, and of the even greater disparate impact on African-Americans caused by setting the cut score at 89. Joyce testified that he set the cut-off score at 89 because it was the most administratively convenient way to trim the list of potential applicants to a manageable number while still fulfilling the hiring needs of the CFD.}}

Not the Chicago test I was talking about. Listen, Outtz is a go to guy, a guy someone pays for testimony. Him and guys like him, on both sides, can come up with some scientific calculation that they can sell as fact. If Chicago used a test that had knowingly had disparate impact then the city is wrong. The cutoff score still gets me though, maybe you can explain, if they set the cutoff at 89 they obviously had enough candidates that scored above that to fill vacancies. So even if the cutoff scores was 70 and they hired down the list the people hired would still be the same. So while having a pass / fail that creates an illusion of less disparate impact the actual hiring would still have racial disparities. I hear and read about cutoff scores alot and the way I see it is if you got a 90 and I got a 70 whether my 70 is pass or fail you will still be hired before me. I can see where this could come into play with how long they run the list, just not sure if that's where they are going with that argument. And again this case I believe is entry level....