Sept. 07--Chicago taxpayers are in line to pick up the tab for a $1.98 million settlement to women denied jobs with the Chicago Fire Department because they failed the physical abilities test.
The 2011 federal lawsuit alleged that 187 women who passed the written test to become firefighters were discriminated against by the test to determine their physical fitness for the job, city Corporation Counsel Stephen Patton told aldermen Friday.
"While 90 percent of men pass this test, only 19 percent of women do, only 1 out of 5," Patton said.
After the suit was filed, the Fire Department agreed to do away with the previous physical skills test, which was used only in Chicago, and instead adopt a test Patton said is "used by hundreds of fire departments across the country and approved by the Department of Justice."
Roughly half of female applicants pass the new physical test, Patton said.
About 138 of the women who sued are eligible to reapply to the Fire Department with the new test, and those who get jobs there will not share the settlement.
The City Council Finance Committee approved the payment, which will head to the full council for approval next week. The city will also be on the hook for legal fees in the case, which could be as high as $1.7 million, Patton said. The city hopes to lower those fees, he said.
It's the latest financial blow suffered by the city for discrimination in the firefighters exam. The city agreed in 2011 to pay $30 million to settle a lawsuit by thousands of African-Americans who did not get placed on the list of potential firefighters because the exam and its qualifying cutoff score favored white job seekers. The city appealed that case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in a legal battle that lasted 13 years.
On Friday, Patton said Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration is trying to avoid those types of protracted legal battles over lawsuits they seem likely to lose, because lawyers' costs stack up. "If we kick the can down the road, what we end up with is, at the end of the day, a bigger hole for taxpayers to pay," he said.
Another lawsuit, filed by five women who failed the physical test to become Chicago Fire Department paramedics, is pending.
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