After more than a year of anguish among the city’s African-American employees, they have forged a united front, acquired powerful allies and moved aggressively to fight what they say is the systemic, institutionalized racism of the city of Los Angeles against its Black workforce.
 
Black employees of the city’s Transportation, Planning, Public Works, and General Services departments and the Department of Water and Power established the Los Angeles Black City Employees for Fairness in December, fought unsuccessfully since then to get their concerns heard — never mind, addressed — by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Joined by the NAACP, civil rights leaders union officials and community activists, the Black employees group held a press conference on the steps of City Hall last week and denounced the mayor for turning a blind eye on the discrimination in city employment and for “ignoring the retaliation by department managers against Black employees who speak out against discrimination.”

“Villaraigosa has repeatedly refused to meet the aggrieved Black city employees to discuss ways and means to end discrimination,” Bernard Hicks, a prime mover of the employees group, said during the press conference.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, announced that his group, together with the NAACP, “will formally call upon the U.S. Justice Department to conduct a fast-track pattern and practice probe into racial discrimination and retaliation against Black Los Angeles city employees.”

Let us back up to Aug. 3, one day before the Black folks’ City Hall press conference. For almost a year, the mayor had ignored the group’s request for a meeting about its concerns. The mayor’s office got wind of the scheduled Aug. 4 press conference and hastily called for a meeting of interested parties on Aug. 3, in an attempt to stop the forthcoming public display of the city’s dirty linen.

The Black workers attended the “mayor’s meeting,” and were accompanied by Leon Jenkins, president of the NAACP; Adrian Dove, head of California CORE; the Rev. Eric Lee, president of SCLC; Michael Davies, president of the Engineers and Architects Association, and Benetta Johnson of the Alameda Job Coalition.

The mayor, of course, was not present at the “mayor’s meeting.” Instead he was represented by the Rev. Leonard Jackson, Villaraigosa’s special assistant in charge of Black people; Rita Robinson, Department of Transportation manager; Valerie Shaw of Public Works, Michael LeGrande, city planning director and an assortment of minor city officials.

The Black employees expressed their anger about being relegated to the lowest levels of employment within city departments — often for 20, 25, 30 years — and given no opportunities for promotion and, if so, being denied promotion because of rigged, anti-Black procedures and/or flagrantly biased preferences. 

For the most part, the mayor’s side expressed “understanding” and suggested that as the result of large-scale early retirement looming among city employees, “a lot” of promotions among the remaining workforce would be forthcoming. 

The mayor’s folks also talked about improving employee training and mentoring programs. The Black workers countered: “People are not getting promoted because they are not qualified but because they are discriminated against, and if we are not dealing with this, we are wasting our time.”

The mayor’s side said: “OK. There is a problem. We’ll meet again on Aug. 25 and you can submit recommendations toward solving it.”

Let us back up to June 16 when NAACP President Jenkins wrote Mayor Villaraigosa a 2-1/2 page single-spaced letter detailing the width and breath of the discrimination Blacks face in the Department of Transportation. He requested a meeting with the mayor about the contents of his letter. Jenkins’ letter was ignored by Villarigosa, Deputy Mayor Larry Frank and Jackson — until they heard about the scheduled press conference.

Let us go back to Dec. 12, 2009 when the Bottom Line reported on employment racism and workplace sexual assaults and harassment in the city’s General Services Department. That did get Frank’s attention, but he implemented a weak-kneed one-agency-at-a-time approach to the big problem that went nowhere primarily because that department did not have a deputy mayor permanently assigned to oversee it.

Let us go back to Sept. 17, 2009 when the Bottom Line began reporting on racism in the Department of Transportation and how the mayor fired former short-term director Gloria Jeff because she tried to correct it and replaced her with Rita Robinson, who offered excuses for it. Some Black transportation workers sued the city over their mistreatment, and their union, the EAA, met with Robinson and presented her a detailed list of about 12 recommendations to reduce racism in her department. She ignored them. So, when the two sides meet on Aug. 25, Robinson can dust those recommendations off and put them back on the table.

And finally, let us go back to five years ago, when I wrote a multi-part series on the blatant and pervasive institutionalized racism in the city’s Planning Department. People sued and Con Howe, the department’s patrician general manager, suddenly retired after 12 years on the job. Villaraigosa appointed Gail Goldberg of San Diego to replace Howe, and they tell me the situation with respect to Blacks and Latinos in the Planning Department have never been worse. After 4-1/2 years on the job, Goldberg retired on July 1, to the deep sigh of relief by the Los Angeles Black City Employees for Fairness.