Comment Number: OL-10500838
Received: 2/22/2005 10:33:26 AM
Subject: Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Request for Comment
Title: National Security Personnel System
CFR Citation: 5 CFR Chapter XCIX and Part 9901
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Comments:

Pay for Performance Atlanta Journal-Constitution February 22, 2005 Pg. 3B Robins Bias Lawsuit Settled For $880,000 Nine white workers sued base By Ron Martz The federal government will pay $880,000 to nine workers at Robins Air Force Base to settle a three-year-old reverse discrimination lawsuit against the Air Force. The nine white male employees, all civilian workers, challenged what they said was a quota system that gave preferential treatment to black and female employees at the base in Warner Robins. Attorney Lee Parks, of Atlanta, said that even though quotas were part of a systemwide problem, a decision was made to settle on behalf of these nine employees because evidence of discrimination against them was strongest. That evidence included e-mails and admissions from supervisors that they were pressured by Air Force headquarters and the Pentagon to increase the appraisals of blacks and women and decrease those of other workers. "The quota-based performance process went on for a good number of years and affected hundreds, if not thousands, of people," said Parks. The settlement in the suit, which was filed in April 2002, was reached Feb. 11. Department of Justice officials in Washington, which negotiated on behalf of the Air Force, did not return a telephone call seeking comment. Parks, who also was successful in his challenge of racial and gender preferences at the University of Georgia, said the quota system at the base was based on demographics of the Middle Georgia region. But the jobs held by the nine plaintiffs "tended to be aircraft mechanics, specialized technical jobs that didn't just draw a generic application pool." "You had to have specific talents to apply for many of those jobs," Parks added. The division in which the men worked when the quotas were in place were part of the Robins Air Logistics Center at the base. The center is responsible for repair and maintenance of F-15, C-130 and C-5 aircraft and all Air Force helicopters. Robins has a civilian work force of just over 13,000 in addition to the more than 6,800 military personnel. The application pool for those technical jobs, Parks said, "seldom mirrored the demographic pool of the geographic area from which Warner Robins draws its work force."