Neena Satija Photo
As the fire department prepares for its first large recruitment effort in four years, Rob Smuts has a new solution to help more New Haveners land a job: Limit the competition.
Smuts, the city’s chief administrative officer, pitched his solution at a briefing before 20 alders and alders-elect Thursday night in City Hall. The briefing came as the city prepares to recruit a new class of 45 entry-level firefighters.
Smuts proposed capping the number of job applicants at 400 residents and 400 non-residents.
“That should significantly decrease the competition from out-of-town,” he said.
The city’s firefighter recruitment drive in 2007 yielded 1,049 applications from out-of-towners and only 257 from New Haveners, Smuts said. That was the city’s last major recruitment effort; the city also fielded a small class of four paramedic firefighters earlier this year.
Smuts’ plan drew strong reactions from aldermen as well as 80 people in the audience, some invited by local NAACP head James Rawlings after he heard about the meeting and expressed public outrage Tuesday that he wasn’t invited.
Rawlings (pictured) objected Thursday to the 50 – 50 split of New Haveners and those from out of town.
“I want 100 percent,” Rawlings announced to the crowd as the meeting concluded. “Why do we have to share this after all these years of being in shackles?”
Several aldermen echoed his call that the city require more than 50 percent of applicants to be New Haven residents.
“Go from 50 – 50 to 60 – 40,” said Frank Douglass, who’s running unopposed for alderman in Dwight’s Ward 2, drawing scattered applause.
Smuts said that would be difficult. “What we don’t want to do is overreach and get sucked back into all that litigation,” he said, referring to the millions of dollars the city lost after the Supreme Court found fault with the fire department’s promotional practices in 2009.
“Isn’t someone going to sue us if we’re at 50 – 50?” said West Rock Alderman Darnell Goldson (pictured). “I want 100…let’s stack it in our folks’ favor and let the chips fall where they may.”
The Supreme Court ruling hinged on the city’s decision to ignore a written promotional test because black firefighters performed poorly compared to their white counterparts. Smuts’ new plan, as he stressed throughout the meeting, was about something different — the number of applicants to begin with, rather than who passes any certification tests (which are different from the promotional tests that were the subject of the court case). He said in the last recruitment drive, the test pass rate was similar — 15 percent — for residents as well as non-residents.
“There are a good number of New Haven applicants, but they get swamped by the huge number of non-residents from across the state and region,” read a statement from a packet about the new plan Smuts passed out to attendees. “We propose leveling the playing field and allowing 400 residents and 400 non-residents.”
If the city had used this plan in 2007, it would have hired more people from the city, according to an analysis Smuts presented. No one from New Haven would have been turned away, since only 257 applied, and hundreds of suburbanites would have been barred. Given that the city adds five points to the applications of New Haven residents, as many as 67 percent of the final hiring pool could have been local. In 2007 New Haveners made up 34.5 percent of the new employees.
As debate between the aldermen at the table passed the hour mark, people in the benches began to get restless. Many of them had hoped the meeting would be a public hearing where they could voice their concerns.
“Is there any public participation in this meeting? Because I’m dying to say something,” asked Scott Marks (pictured), a preacher at the New Growth Praise Center, as laughter rippled through the audience. Smuts said he would take concerns from others after aldermen had asked all their questions.
A half-hour later, retired New Haven firefighter Ron Benson told Smuts to “run [the meeting] better and let the public speak, because you’re just going in circles.”
Actually, Smuts responded, this was a briefing for the Board of Aldermen only. It was open to the public, but it wasn’t really a public meeting.
Ultimately, “it ended up being a public meeting,” Smuts said after the meeting ended and the aldermanic chambers emptied around 8 p.m. “There was a lot of passion, and that’s good. Some of the things they brought up, we definitely have the potential of doing.”
In the coming weeks Smuts will present his proposal to the Civil Service Commission, composed of five mayoral appointees, for final approval. The New Haven Fire Department starts accepting applications on Nov. 28, so the hiring process will need to be finalized before then.
Rawlings said he was pleased with the meeting. “We’ve had an open discussion about something that is normally discussed behind closed doors,” he said. “And now we’re going to push harder than ever before.”
In response to Rawlings’ charge that the city deliberately didn’t tell anyone about the briefing, Smuts said, “Mr. Rawlings didn’t return my phone call.” He added, “I wanted to make sure that I start with the Board of Aldermen and then go from there.”
Along with Smuts and Assistant Fire Chief Patrick Egan, Assistant Police Chief Petisia Adger presented the police department’s effort to hire more cops, which begins on Oct. 31.
The police don’t have caps but are trying their best to recruit more applicants from the city, Adger said. About 300 people showed up to a recent Police Academy open house and almost a third were New Haven residents, which she called “amazing.”
Alders were more skeptical. “Why are we having two-thirds of folks in the suburbs learning about this?” Goldson asked.
Alderwoman Maureen O’Sullivan-Best (pictured) was one of the most vocal skeptics. She asked whether the city could help people who don’t have health insurance get a doctor’s note so they could pass one of the police applicant tests required by the state.
“Mr. Smuts, do you have an answer?” she asked pointedly.
“I don’t at this time,” Smuts responded. “That’s a good question, and we’ll definitely look into that.”
One of the last people to speak before Rawlings at the meeting was Gary Tinney (pictured), president of the local black firefighters’ association, the New Haven Firebirds. He cited a recently-decided Supreme Court case that cost Chicago $45 million because of a discriminatory firefighters’ test.
“These folks want the jobs,” he said, pointing to the people in the audience. “They deserve a chance. We have to be at the table.”
Smuts said it was possible there would be more public meetings about his plan after Thursday night’s, but he’s working on a tight timeline and wants to pack things in quickly.
He could definitely address some people’s suggestions, like discounting application fees for city residents or re-visiting what city residency means. Currently, applicants simply have to live in New Haven at the time they apply to be considered a resident of the city; there’s no time requirement. Adding 10 points to New Haveners’ applications instead of five, or only accepting applicants from locals, would be more difficult because of the threat of a lawsuit, Smuts said.