Bilingual Hiring for Firefighters, Dispatchers OKd

The Monterey Park City Council has moved to end a long-running controversy by adopting a program to recruit bilingual firefighters and 911 emergency dispatchers.

In other action, the council Tuesday met with Los Angeles County officials to develop an affirmative action plan to recruit more minority employees.

The bilingual hiring program--rejected by the Personnel Board three months ago--aims to have firefighters and dispatchers fluent in Cantonese, Mandarin or Spanish on each shift. It divides applicants for those jobs into three groups--Chinese-speaking, Spanish-speaking and English-only; each applicant is hired from a group depending on the language skill needed.

The program also gives a $150 monthly bonus to dispatchers who speak Chinese or Spanish as well as English.

Although many Southern California cities give bonuses for bilingual skills, none is taking as aggressive an approach as Monterey Park, city officials say.

Council members Fred Balderrama, Judy Chu and Sam Kiang voted to approve the dispatchers’ hiring program; Mayor Betty Couch and Marie T. Purvis opposed it. Couch cast the lone vote against the firefighters’ program.

Kiang said that in addition to helping the city communicate with its growing immigrant populations, the program is an effective way to recruit more Asians and Latinos and avoid the possibility of a discrimination lawsuit.

A few months ago, he noted, Alhambra settled a Justice Department discrimination suit by promising to hire more minority firefighters.

Alhambra’s Fire Department “does not have any Asians and only a few Hispanics,” Kiang said. “Monterey Park is even worse. We have a 56% Asian population and have zero Asians. The only way to avert a lawsuit, which may be imminent, is to implement a program that would guarantee the hiring of some minority members.”

But a lawyer for the Monterey Park Firefighters Assn., Sylvia Kellison, said hiring according to language skill was “not the answer to the problem. (It’s) putting a Band-Aid on a much greater injury.”

The council had to maneuver around several obstacles before approving the program. Until recently, the Personnel Board had the ultimate authority to set hiring policies. After the board rejected the bilingual hiring programs, the council passed a law allowing it to override Personnel Board decisions.

That action brought strong protests from residents and employees’ representatives who opposed the bilingual hiring program. Critics maintained it discriminated against English-speaking employees and those who speak languages other than Spanish or Chinese, and did not guarantee advancement opportunities for bilingual employees.