NY Bias Suit Winners Sit Down with Top Brass

After settling a race discrimination law suit against the FDNY, two Emergency Medical Service (EMS) workers finally had their sit-down meeting with a top official from the FDNY. At the meeting, the two EMS workers (one Hispanic/Latino and the other African American) urged the FDNY chief to institute a color-blind written test to determine high-level EMS promotions. The two workers also urged that the promotion test not contain in-person interviews, which could promote racism and discrimination of potential candidates. Since 1996, when the EMS was merged with the FDNY, promotions to the level of captain and higher could only happen with an evaluation and interview. One worker stated, “We wanted to show him where the current system failed…The upper ranks simply do not look like the rest of the EMS.” The FDNY chief vowed to review the current promotion procedures.

We’ll see if anything changes!

Source: www.nydailynews.com, EMS bias suit wins sitdown with brass, By Jonathan Lemire, November 10, 2006)