CHICAGO — The Chicago fire department on Tuesday began retesting applicants from 16 years ago after a Supreme Court decision ordered the department to hire 111 black firefighters.
A class-action lawsuit by 6,000 African-American applicants alleged racial bias in the 1995 firefighter testing process, according to the Chicago Tribune.
During the original exam, 1,800 test-takers qualified, but the lawsuit alleges 78 percent hired were white and randomly selected, without counting the results of the physical test.
The lawsuit argued that the city’s cutoff score between “qualified” and “highly qualified” was arbitrary, leaving out thousands of qualified black applicants.
“For years, I would see the new candidates running down Canal Street, and I’d be wondering when it would be my turn,” said LaShonn Tomlinson, 38, a firefighter hopeful whose test results showed he was qualified. “But I never got the call.”
Nearly 1,000 applicants from the class of 1995 were chosen by lottery for testing, said department spokesperson Larry Langford. Of those, 111 will go through six months of training and be hired if they pass.
For every month that hiring is delayed, the city must provide an additional $500,000 in back pay. Class members who are not hired could receive a share of $30 million in damages.
“I think that for us and for our clients, this is an important day,” said Josh Civin, an assistant counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, “Because we are closer to justice for our clients who experienced discrimination at the hands of the city.”