City settles bias case in sheriff hires
A STORIED EAST Village Catholic high school that was on the brink of closing a few years ago has undergone a miraculous resurrection — but at the cost of alienating teachers seeking to join a union.
New leadership at all-boys La Salle Academy quadrupled fund-raising and boosted enrollment.
But the school’s president, Catherine Guerriero — installed in July 2014 at a ceremony attended by Matilda Cuomo, the governor’s mother and a La Salle trustee — has proved a hardcharging boss, some staffers say.
Teachers say that though Guerriero backed unions when she labeled herself a “workingclass hero” in her unsuccessful run for city public advocate in 2013, she’s undermined their efforts to get a union at La Salle.
“There were two faces to Cathy,” said Mike Stewart, 34, a world religion and health teacher and member of the senior staff who resigned in April 2016.
“There was the public face where she’d say, ‘Oh, I’m for the union.’ Then in private she’d be getting the union busters to come in.”
In May 2016, La Salle had 24 staff teachers — and 17 of whom voted to become part of the Federation of Catholic Teachers, OPEIU Local 153.
Over the past two years, 11 of those 17 quit La Salle — taking jobs at other schools, retiring or leaving the field entirely.
A major flash point between the staff and Guerriero, some teachers contend, was their desire to join Local 153. Some teachers said her behavior was “anti-Catholic.”
The first hint of workplace trouble was a memo from Guerriero informing all teachers they needed to have graduate degrees and other certifications — a standard that isn’t just a best practice, Guerriero told the Daily News, but a “routine practice.”
For some of the faculty, the memo triggered job fears. “That letter frightened many teachers,” said Frank, a 44-year-old former teacher who gave only his first name.
It also triggered a push to unionize, which some faculty members hoped would bring some job security.
But Guerriero — who maintains her memo was not an attempt to force out longtime teachers — didn’t take kindly to the idea of organized labor, current and ex-staffers said.
Guerriero bullied pro-union teachers, brought in union busters, used stall tactics and refused to make progress on the contract, according to former staff THE CITY HAS settled a federal discrimination suit brought by two black men and a black woman who claim biased psychological screening kept them from becoming city sheriffs, officials said Saturday.
Barry Brown, Sean Harris and Tara Johnson will each get more than $200,000 for being drummed out of a city sheriffs’ class in 2013.
Brown (photo inset) — a Marine Corps veteran — and Harris will each receive $220,000. Johnson, who ultimately got a job in another city agency, will get $205,000, their lawyer Eric Sanders said.
The trio were among five black candidates who failed a psychological exam and were booted from the class, the suit said. The five were the only African-Americans in the class.
The 10 others in the academy class — which included seven white candidates, two Hispanic candidates and one Asian-American candidate — ended up as deputy sheriffs.
Despite the findings of the psychological examiners, Sanders said, four of the five terminated black candidates found law enforcement jobs elsewhere — one as a New Jersey state trooper.
The suit “shed light on the fundamental unfairness of the psychological evaluation . . . for African-Americans,” Sanders said.
Sheriffs — who work for the city Finance Department — enforce court-ordered evictions and property seizures. They also handle tax and license enforcement, and have arrest powers.
Brown, 44, passed the written and physical exams — but his plans went off the rails when he took the psychological exam run by the NYPD.
The examiner said Brown had trouble coping, suffered from stress, lacked interpersonal skills and was unsuited for the job, according to the suit.
“The city is committed to the fair and equitable administration of the exams it administers,” a spokeswoman for the Law Department said.