We start first with another video of Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission top dogs Phil Evenson and Ken Yunker working very hard and quite politely to shoo away those pesky Environmental Justice Task Force members that want SEWRPC to get outside help with the socio-economic analyses that should be part of SEWRPC studies.

Below that is another excerpt from the NAACP’s discrimination complaint against SEWRPC. The complaint was filed with the US Department of Labor’s Office of Contract Compliance.

The two again show a consistent SEWRPC attitude outdated arrogance. The first part of this series is here.

The video

Excerpt from the complaint

Facts Relating to Non-Compliance with Affirmative Action in Promotion

24. In or about March 2008, it became public knowledge that SEWRPC’s Executive Director planned to retire at the end of 2008.

25. The Executive Director is a professional position within SEWRPC, and the retirement of the Executive Director would create a professional “job opening” in that position.

26. In 2006, SEWRPC established an Environmental Justice Task Force (EJTF), the stated mission of which is to “enhance the consideration and integration of environmental justice throughout the regional planning process,” by, inter alia, “ensur[ing] public involvement of low-income and minority groups in decision making” and “assur[ing that] low-income and minority groups receive proportionate share of benefits.”

27. The EJTF is a group that includes persons of color, persons with disabilities, and members of neighborhood organizations.

28. At a meeting on March 18, 2008, members of the EJTF – having learned that SEWRPC’s white non-Hispanic Executive Director was planning to retire – requested that the process to hire a new Executive Director be conducted in a manner to ensure a diverse pool of candidates and participation from diverse constituencies (such as the EJTF) in the selection process, including helping to identify appropriate candidates for consideration in the pool of candidates.

29. On March 20, 2008, SEWRPC’s Executive Committee rejected the request of SEWRPC’s own EJTF and instead voted to negotiate a contract to promote SEWRPC’s assistant director, a white non-Hispanic person, to the position of Executive Director.

30. On April 24, 2008, SEWRPC’s Executive Committee ratified a contract with its assistant director to become Executive Director.

31. SEWRPC conducted no search for the Executive Director opening, and thus did not comply with the commitments it made in its AA Plan to advertise job openings in minority media and to minority organizations and neighborhood groups.

32. SEWRPC conducted no search for the Executive Director opening, and thus did not comply with the commitments it made in its own AA Plan to work with minority groups and neighborhood organizations to identify persons who might be able to fill openings with the Commission.

33. At a May 27, 2008 EJTF meeting, EJTF members requested that SEWRPC conduct a search to ensure a diverse pool of candidates for the assistant director position being vacated by the assistant director due to his hiring as Executive Director.34. At the May 27 EJTF meeting, the current Executive Director stated that SEWRPC preferred to “promote from within.”

35. At an EJTF meeting on July 29, 2008, SEWRPC’s Executive Director reiterated that SEWRPC “promotes from within” “whenever possible” and that any affirmative action in hiring is focused on entry-level positions.

36. At the July 29 EJTF meeting, EJTF members reiterated their concerns about SEWRPC’s lack of affirmative action for hiring at multiple levels, not just for entry level positions.

37. Despite the facts that SEWRPC has been subject to affirmative action requirements for more than three decades; has attained only negligible improvement in minority hiring even at entry levels, especially for professional staff; has a total lack of persons of color in senior and supervisory professional positions; and has an almost all-white professional staff, “promoting from within” is its longstanding pattern and practice.

38. As a result of SEWRPC’s history of failing to recruit and hire meaningful numbers of people of color to even entry level professional positions, its insistance on a policy of promoting from within has resulted in precluding persons of color from being placed in leadership positions within the organization as these positions have become available.