Excerpts from the ChicagoSunTimes.com:
Three years ago, Chicago spent nearly $2 million — and $1.7 million more in legal fees — to compensate dozens of women denied firefighter jobs because of a discriminatory test of upper body strength that city hall has now scrapped.
Now, a dozen women who wanted desperately to become paramedics are accusing the Chicago Fire Department of devising two new physical agility tests that are equally biased against women.
One test requires candidates to go up six flights of stairs with a 250-pound dummy within eight minutes. The other requires candidates to step onto and off of an 18-inch-high box to the beat of a metronome for two minutes without missing a beat while holding 25-pound weights in each hand.
The lawsuit filed Friday in federal court alleges that the two tests were invented to eliminate women in the Chicago Fire Department where discrimination against women is stubborn and purposeful.
The women are seeking back pay and other measures to compensate for the discrimination they have suffered.
Jamie Snevely, 33, said she was terminated on the day in September 2014 that she was scheduled to graduate from the fire academy. The termination was subsequently rescinded and Snevely and four other women were given six additional weeks to train and re-test. She said she was stopped during the re-test and told she was done.
She added, “It was women they did not want for the most part. Five out of the seven of us women in Alpha class got fired and the other two were cheated through. I watched instructors carry the chairs for them. I literally watched one of the instructors stop his stopwatch and give it to her. She had relatives and connections into the fire department.”
[An attorney] noted that two of the dozen plaintiffs heard Fire Commissioner Jose Santiago say that the stair test was “not realistic.”
City Law Department spokesman Bill McCaffrey said: “We cannot comment on the pending litigation, however, the Fire Department does not condone discrimination of any kind, and no longer uses the physical abilities tests that are included in this suit.”
In late September, a federal appeals court ruled in favor of female paramedics in striking down a physical performance test used by the city to hire paramedics for over a decade.
The decision in the sex discrimination lawsuit, Ernst v. City of Chicago, overturned federal district court verdicts in 2014 and 2015 finding the city’s use of the test did not discriminate against female applicants.
“The physical entrance exam … risks cementing unfairness into Chicago’s job-application process,” the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals said in siding with the paramedics.
The fire department has been mired in litigation over racially and sexually discriminatory hiring practices for decades.
thanks Dan
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#1 by Crabby Milton on November 4, 2016 - 12:16 PM
Well FireTroll, I’m not the one sueing.
Never did I say that all female paramedics and firefighters play the victim card. The actions of a few cause me to question the motives.
Why yes thank you. I will look at some more buses as long as I’m on the internet.
#2 by Chuck on November 3, 2016 - 11:03 PM
Ted, wake up. A) They send a fire company now on every ambulance run now. and B) Firefighter – paramedic relations have sucked since EMS was part of the fire department. They teach candidates that EMS is the enemy from day 1 in the Academy.
#3 by FireTroll on November 3, 2016 - 5:14 PM
Hey Crabby, maybe stick to ogling busses and leave the misogynistic comments at home? It’s one thing to argue that the test may be well designed, realistic, and necessary. It’s another thing all together to throw around sexist stereotypes that are so tired and worn they just make you look bad. Comments like those make me suspect there may be merit to lawsuits like these..
#4 by Crabby Milton on November 3, 2016 - 11:11 AM
Yeah let’s all sue all the fire depts. I’m too old and probably can’t handle much of the physical end of it so why can’t they make it easy for a middle age guy like me? Standards are standards so I guess they expect them to change the rules to let everyone who wants in to come in.
Yes, they’ll change it so paramedics won’t have to do specific parts of their job so the females won’t have to worry about getting blood on their clothing or break a nail.
#5 by Ted on November 2, 2016 - 9:58 PM
Yeah because we never have a 400LB person that has to be carried down from the 4th floor. Oh wait.. That’s what us fireman are for. Pretty soon medics won be required to carry any patient and they will send a fire company on every run. How do you think that go over with firefighter- paramedic relations?
#6 by Bob C. on November 2, 2016 - 9:31 PM
“I’m an out of shape slob and not fit enough to get hired? It’s ok, I’ll just sue”. Eventually there will be no physical requirements. It’s sad.