COUNTYWIDE : Officials Meet to Discuss Deputies’ Claims of Bias

Hit with a $7.5-million discrimination claim by black sheriff’s deputies, county officials met with union representatives and black firefighters Tuesday to discuss reforms in minority hiring, training and promotions in both departments.

But representatives of the Sheriff’s Department and the deputies who filed the claim did not participate in the meeting, convened under order of the County Board of Supervisors.

Union officials said the meeting with County Chief Administrative Officer Richard Wittenberg and Personnel Director Ronald Komers was a first step to easing racial tensions in the public safety departments.

“It often takes a crisis to get things done, and a $7.5-million lawsuit is a crisis,” said Ken Maffei, president of the 400-member Ventura County Professional Firefighters Assn.

“Through education, a lot of the problems can be resolved, since a lot of discrimination is due to ignorance,” said John Alford, a black firefighter who attended.

“The county was sensitive when they put an affirmative-action plan together five years ago. The problem is, they haven’t achieved their goals five years later.”

The 11 black deputies who filed claims last month declined an invitation to the meeting.

Bert Voorhees III, their Los Angeles lawyer, said the deputies were not given an advance agenda.

Voorhees said his clients may meet with county officials April 12.

Undersheriff Larry Carpenter, Assistant Sheriff Richard Bryce and Lt. Dante Honorico, who is heading an internal investigation, left the meeting after finding that the black deputies were not planning to attend. Bryce said “there wasn’t any value in staying” for a meeting the deputies urged the supervisors to arrange.

“We came in good faith trying to deal with the problem and those people chose not to show up,” Bryce said.

The county has until May 4 to respond to the claims, which are a precursor to filing lawsuits.

The suits allege that blacks were discriminated against in hiring, promotions, performance evaluations, salary and other personnel matters.

More than 60 officers are named as having taken part in racist actions or remarks.

They ranged from racial slurs and a death threat to painting minstrel faces on photos of black inmates and a deputy’s selling another deputy a knife bearing a Ku Klux Klan insignia.

The county’s black firefighters have not filed claims, but discrimination persists and needs to be remedied, said Fire Capt. Charles Merricks, who joined in the meeting.