The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
NEWS HAVEN AND THE SUPREME COURT
Firefigthers case set national precedent
NEW HAVEN — In the basement of the Hall of Records, the crowded civil service hearings might have seemed just the latest controversy in the contentious history of racially factious promotions at the city’s Fire Department.
No one could have known, in 2004, that the decisions unfolding would ultimately land before the U.S. Supreme Court and indelibly imprint two New Haven names into the history of civil rights law.
But before there was Ricci v. DeStefano, there were two uncertified, heavily redacted civil service promotional lists for New Haven fire lieutenant and captain.
“It was clear that the civil service board was trying to be fair. The problem is the city was trying to orchestrate and push the civil service board to scuttle the results,” Frank Ricci, then a six-year firefighter with the department, recalled. “I thought they were going to throw out the list from the very first meeting.”
That was the beginning of the long, circuitous and at times bitter legal process and no one,
not the plaintiffs or defendants in the subsequent federal lawsuit, could have projected the ultimate destination.
“We had no indication that this was going to be a landmark case at the United States Supreme Court,” Ricci said.
Rights
In 2003, 118 New Haven firefighters took examinations for promotion to lieutenant and captain, and the results would determine who could be promoted over the following two years. Promotional exams in New Haven occur infrequently, so much was at stake.
Then the results came back. White candidates had outperformed minority candidates. The mayor and other city officials convened a series of civil service board meetings.
Some firefighters and black community leaders argued the tests were flawed and threatened a discrimination lawsuit if the results were adopted. Other firefighters argued the exams were valid and fair and firefighters who scored at the top deserved to be promoted. They threatened a discrimination lawsuit if the results were tossed.
After five often contentious public hearings, the Civil Service Commission deadlocked in a 2-2 vote. The test results were abandoned. It was March 18, 2004.
On July 8, 2004, a group of firefighters — 19 white and one Hispanic — filed a federal lawsuit, Ricci v. DeStefano, alleging the city corrupted the civil service process to pander to political cronies and the politically important black vote.
Ricci was the lead plaintiff. The lead defendant was John DeStefano Jr., then the city’s five-term incumbent mayor.
The exams and ‘disparate impact’