6 Pomona Firefighters Sue, Allege Reverse Bias : Employment: White workers say they were demoted instead of less-experienced minorities when they were transferred to county department.

Six Pomona firefighters have filed a reverse discrimination lawsuit against the city, charging that they were demoted instead of less-experienced minority officers when the city transferred fire services to Los Angeles County last year.

The officers--all white--say that the city used a discriminatory system when they were transferred into the county Fire Department in July. Several, calling themselves “sacrificial lambs,” claimed at a news conference Thursday that Pomona city officials bowed to pressure from the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. The NAACP had expressed concern that minority firefighters would be treated unfairly.

The city began contracting with the county for its fire services in an effort to save costs. The county was able to absorb the city’s 101 officers, but not at the same rank. County officials left it up to Pomona’s Fire Department to decide who would retain his old rank, and who would have to settle for a lower position.

The suit, filed in federal court in Los Angeles, seeks unspecified damages, lost wages and back pay. The firefighters’ attorney, Howard Rosen, said that three other firefighters will join the lawsuit within the next few weeks.

“I don’t have a problem with minorities having rights,” said Scott Zbinden, a former captain who was demoted to engineer, or driver of a firetruck. “I think they should have their rights. But I felt they took away my rights. That’s my problem with this.”

When the county transfer plan was approved in May, 1994, it called for Pomona’s firefighters to be placed in the county department based on the number of years they had served in their present rank. But after meeting with NAACP officials, the city changed its method. Firefighters would be placed into positions based on total years in the department, rather than the time spent in their current rank. That tended to be more favorable to minorities because so few had been promoted to upper ranks.

“The NAACP put a tremendous amount of pressure on the city,” said Russell Bohse, 39, who had been a captain since 1990 but was demoted to an engineer. “We were sacrificial lambs so we would relieve that pressure on other city entities and departments.”

City officials would not comment on the lawsuit because they had not seen it.

Ron Vera, an attorney for the Pomona Valley chapter of the NAACP, said that the white firemen’s gripes ignore the context of years of discrimination against minority officers in the Pomona Fire Department.

After the NAACP filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 1988, Pomona agreed to a settlement in which the Fire Department was to set hiring goals to increase the number of minority firefighters.