By Rashad Christian
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
Baltimore County has reached a $2 million settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice to resolve claims of hiring discrimination by the county’s police department, Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski announced today.
The justice department filed an employment discrimination lawsuit against Baltimore County and the Baltimore County Police Department under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in August of 2019. Title VII prohibits any employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and nationality.
The lawsuit claims that police department hiring decisions between 2009 and 2016 were based on examinations that were not job-related and disproportionately excluded African Americans.
Under this settlement agreement, Baltimore County is agreeing to refrain from further use of unlawful written examinations, making up to 20 priority “relief hires of African-American claimants who took and failed the previous written examination,” and providing back pay to eligible African American claimants through the $2 million settlement fund.
According its Aug. 27, 2019 complaint, the justice department alleged that African Americans who took the 2015 exam to become a police cadet or entry-level officer passed at a lower rate than white applicants who took the same test. The department described the difference as “statistically significant..
In a press release made public toay by the Department of Justice, Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband said that communities are better served when their police departments “recruit and select qualified officers using job-related criteria.”
“When police department’s fail to do so, and instead disproportionately screen out members of protected classes, they violate federal law,” Dreiband said.
Baltimore County Police Chief Melissa Hyatt said that she wants residents to see themselves reflected in in the police department’s ranks and wants to strengthen the relationship between the community and BCPD.
“While maintaining our exceptional hiring standards, we are taking committed action to diversify our department, and we will continue building on these efforts in the months and years ahead to improve our capacity for diverse recruitment to make a strong department even stronger,” Hyatt said.
BCPD has already taken steps to increase the recruitment of African American applicants. Hyatt has hired BCPD’s first chief diversity and inclusion officer as well as an independent third-party organization to conduct a comprehensive review of the hiring practices.