Minority Hiring, Loan Processing : Agriculture Agency Rights Record Hit

When a white farmer and a black farmer in Natchitoches Parish, La., failed to provide enough information on their operating loan applications, the Farmers Home Administration (FmHA) rejected the black farmer’s request but gave the white farmer 30 extra days to comply.

Although the white farmer did not respond to the offer and his application was withdrawn, an Agriculture Department civil rights review team said the agency’s actions suggested illegal discrimination.

During a study last year of civil rights compliance by Agriculture Department agencies in Louisiana, the team found another example in the same FmHA parish office: A black man’s rural housing loan request was rejected because he had a bad credit rating. In fact, four creditors rated him satisfactory and a fifth said the man was three months delinquent on a loan.

In West Feliciana Parish, where 43% of the farmers are black, there were no minorities or women on the elected local Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (ASCS) committee that oversees federal farm programs. Nor did the panel have a minority adviser, as required by ASCS rules, the reviewers found.

Oklahoma Counties

Similarly, in Oklahoma, a department review team found that ASCS committees in counties across the state did not have proportionate numbers of minority and female members. Only two county committees had a minority adviser, an appointed position required when more than 5% of the farmers are minorities and there is no elected minority member.

These and other irregularities, including disproportionately small numbers of minority hiring and inadequate civil rights training, were found in reviews of the equal employment opportunity compliance by the ASCS, the FmHA and the Soil Conservation Service in Louisiana and Oklahoma. In Texas, the FmHA and SCS were reviewed.

Generally, the department’s Office of Advocacy and Enterprise said in reports released recently, these key department agencies in the three states were in compliance with civil rights requirements. But an exception was the FmHA operation in Texas, where reviewers found “severe under-representation of blacks and Hispanics in the FmHA work force.” The report also found inadequate equal employment opportunity training and a “prevailing view” among women that “sex discrimination often enters into employment decisions.”

Discrimination Complaints

The team wrote that the sex discrimination view was “corroborated by the number of sex discrimination complaints lodged and by the lack of women in higher graded positions.” The average civil service grade for all minority employees was GS-7; it was GS-5, Step 2, for all women, compared to GS-10, Step 8, for white male employees of the FmHA.

The Texas FmHA also was criticized for hiring a greater percentage of white males in the last three years than in the Texas civilian labor force, while minorities were hired at a lower rate than in the civilian labor force. Blacks were promoted at a lower rate than their representation in the FmHA work force.

Texas employees of the Soil Conservation Service told interviewers they believed their agency was sincerely committed to equal employment programs, but the review team said it found under-representation of minorities that were a “major deficiency.” Of the 950 SCS employees, 730 were white males; 106 were black or Latino males.

In all three states, the reviewers also found that the agencies were not maintaining records describing participation in federal programs based on ethnic background, race and sex, as required. In each case, the agencies were directed to establish proper record-keeping systems.