Judge orders hiring of minority firefighters
A federal judge yesterday ordered fire departments around the state to offer jobs to about 50 minority candidates who had been excluded from working as firefighters by a discriminatory hiring exam.
The ruling ends a 22-month legal struggle over hiring practices within the state's fire departments that was prompted by a discrimination lawsuit filed by four black men from Lynn.
In August, US District Court Judge Patti D. Saris ruled that the cognitive ability test administered to firefighting candidates around the state in 2002 and 2004 discriminated against minority applicants and violated federal civil rights law as well as a three-decade-old court order to integrate Massachusetts fire departments.
Saris found that the exam sought to evaluate skills that had little to do with fighting fires.
She ordered that fire departments offer jobs to minority candidates who applied in 2002 and 2004 and should have gotten jobs but for the cognitive exam. That would cover about 50 people, mostly in Boston, according to the Boston Society of Vulcans, which represents black and Hispanic firefighters and intervened with the NAACP on the plaintiffs' side.
Boston Fire Department officials did not comment.
The society's president, Karen Miller , said that an undetermined number of those 50 candidates had moved on to other jobs or out of the region but that many probably would take up the offer.
Although fire officials overhauled the exam before it was administered this past summer, lawyers in the case said they would scrutinize those results soon to make sure the test did not unfairly disqualify minorities.
"The 2006 exam is a big change from the previous exams, but we're still going to analyze the results," said Shannon Liss-Riordan , who represented the plaintiffs -- Jacob and Noah Bradley , Jared Thomas , and Keith Ridley.
"They are especially excited about this and looking forward to getting hired," said Liss-Riordan.
Jacob Bradley has been hired by the Lynn Fire Department.
Saris also ruled that each candidate is eligible for back pay.
