FDNY Bias Case is Slowly Moving Along

Queens Chronicle - July 16, 2010

by AnnMarie Costella , Chronicle Reporter

It has been nearly five months since a federal court judge ruled that the FDNY engaged in intentionally discriminatory hiring practices, and little has taken place publicly since then, but a court date scheduled for next week may change all that.

Since a new budget deal for the next fiscal year has averted the threatened shut down of 20 fire companies that were in danger of being eliminated, the city will have to hire more recruits, according to Paul Mannix, an FDNY deputy chief with Division 6 in the Bronx.

On July 20, the judge will be looking at exam 6019, administered in 2007 to determine its fairness, according to Connie Pankratz, a spokeswoman for the city's Law Department. If it is not deemed objectionable, the candidates who passed could be hired as probationary firefighters, Mannix says.

In January, U.S. District Court Judge Nicholas Garaufis ruled that written exams administered to FDNY applicants in 1999 and 2002 are invalid due to bias and threatened to force the city to institute racial hiring quotas. The decision came as a result of a lawsuit filed by the Vulcan Society, a fraternal organization of black firefighters, who have consistently lamented the lack of diversity in the FDNY.