Firebirds Vow To Keep Up Pressure vs. Firefighter ​“Lotto”

John Tucker said he studied hard to fulfill his childhood dream of becoming a firefighter, then hit the jackpot: He scored 100 on the civil-service hiring exam.

Then he learned he still had to win a round of Lotto as well.

Tucker, a 27-year-old emergency-room tech, was among 99 applicants who scored 100 on the test. The city expects to have only 10 – 25 slots open in its next class. So the Fire Commission decided to hold a ping pong ball lottery to decide which of the 100-scorers to send conditional employment offers.

The New Haven Firebirds Society organized 31 of those 100-scorers to go to court seeking to stop that lottery hours before it was to take place Wednesday night. As first reported in this article, the commission then canceled the lottery and returned to the quest of figuring out how to proceed.

Friday afternoon, Tucker joined joined other applicants at a press conference to decry the planned lottery and appeal for allowing all 99 top scorers to advance to the vetting process. That includes an agility test, medical exam, background check, and interview with the chief.

“I always wanted to be a firefighter since I was a little kid playing with fire trucks,” Tucker said. ​“It’s not fair. We should get a fair chance to test for the” job.

Fire officials argued that that would take too long (the list, certified 16 months ago, expires in January) and cost too much money. (The police get paid overtime to conduct the background checks.) They hit upon the lottery idea with the argument that a random process would be fairest.

At Friday’s press conference, held in the Minore’s parking lot next to the Whalley Avenue police substation, members of the Firebirds argued that the only fair solution is to stick to the original rules, even if that takes longer and costs more. They argued the vetting could still be completed before the list expires. (Read more about both sides’ arguments here.)

New Haven has wrestled before with the question of what constitutes the fairest way to hire or promote public-safety personnel. In fact, it can seem like an exception if a hiring or promotional test doesn’t land in court or at least spark controversy over race or equal opportunity. Controversy over one fire exam landed at the U.S. Supreme Court (then the stage of the Yale Repertory Theatre).

The Firebirds Society has been in the mix of those decades-long debates. The society organized this new lawsuit over the lottery; the corresponding secretary, Lt. Samod Rankins, is the named plaintiff.

“I don’t care about the price. I don’t care how much time it takes. They deserve the same opportunity we were all given,” Rankins said at Friday’s presser in reference to the 100-scorers standing beside him.

Retired Firebirds leader Gary Tinney, who currently serves as executive vice-president of the International Association of Black Firefighters, put the case in the context of ​“a 50-year fight against systemic racism.”

“This list is something we fought for for years and years and years,” to enable more New Haveners to become New Haven firefighters, Tinney said.

As usual with arguments over race and opportunity, the debate in this case has nuances. The Firebirds are not seeking an outcome that would necessarily lead to more firefighters of color being hired. Instead, they’re arguing for preserving a process that afforded opportunities for more New Haveners to land jobs: City residents were awarded 10 extra points on the test. In the end, around 90 percent of the 100-scorers were New Haven residents. The group includes more people of color than usual, given New Haven’s more diverse population than the suburbs’.

In answer to a reporter’s question Friday, Firebirds President Lt. Ernest Jones acknowledged that enabling all 99 finalists to complete the vetting process could conceivably produce more suburban or white firefighters than would the planned lottery. That’s OK, he said: The point is that the finalists worked hard and succeeded, and therefore shouldn’t lose out on their dream due to a random fourth-quarter change in the rules.

“The point is fairness,” Jones said.

Furthermore, he argued, the vetting process, rather than a Lotto-style ​“roll of the dice,” would produce higher quality firefighters, which serves the public interest.

Board of Fire Commissioners President Rev. Steven Cousin said Friday that the process is on hold in the wake of the lawsuit’s filing.

“We’re waiting to meet with the [city] corporation counsel to tell us how to proceed,” Cousin said.

Meanwhile, the Firebirds vowed to keep up the pressure on officials.

“If you don’t do right by these residents, we will hold you accountable,” Rankins said. The prospective firefighters’ ​“futures should not depend on the Lotto.”