Palmer v. City of Oakland

• Decision Date: 02 November 1978
• Citation: 86 Cal.App.3d 39,150 Cal.Rptr. 41
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: Jackson T. PALMER, International Association of Fire Fighters, Local 55, Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. CITY OF OAKLAND, Civil Service Board of the City of Oakland, Cecil Riley, City Manager of the City of Oakland, Defendants and Respondents. Civ. 40232.

Page 41

150 Cal.Rptr. 41

86 Cal.App.3d 39

Jackson T. PALMER, International Association of Fire Fighters, Local 55, Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. CITY OF OAKLAND, Civil Service Board of the City of Oakland, Cecil Riley, City Manager of the City of Oakland, Defendants and Respondents.

Civ. 40232.

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 1, California.

Nov. 2, 1978.

Davis, Cowell & Bowe, San Francisco, for plaintiffs and appellants.

Bonjour, Gough, Stone & Remer, Oakland, for defendant and respondent Oakland Black Fire Fighters' Assoc.

Patricia Ann McKinley, James Stanford White, Oakland, for defendants and respondents Manuel Navarro and Donald Raabe.

David A. Self, City Atty., William C. Sharp, Deputy City Atty., Oakland, for defendant and respondent City of Oakland.

ELKINGTON, Associate Justice.

The City of Oakland (City) had for some time been involved in extensive litigation concerning the rights of, and claimed discrimination against, minority persons, particularly blacks, in relation to job and promotional opportunities in the City's fire department. Minority persons comprised 51 percent of the City's population, while they held 11.2 percent of the fire department's uniformed jobs. In the promotional grades (above the entering rank of hoseman) they occupied 4.7 percent of the positions. And of the 77 lieutenants' classifications, they filled only one of them. International Association of Fire Fighters, Local 55 (Local 55), was the recognized representative of the City's firefighters, including their 11.2 percentage of minority persons. Oakland Black Fire Fighters Association (Black Fire Fighters Association) had a membership of all or most of the City's black firefighters, who in turn comprised more than 75 percent of the fire department's minority persons. The Black Fire Fighters Association contended that Local 55 generally furthered the interests of its white, to the prejudice of its minority person, members.

The City's Civil Service Board had announced and scheduled a promotional examination for the positions of fire department lieutenant, to be held April 29, 1975.

After notification of the examination date to the City's firefighters, Local 55 requested that the date be changed to April 8, 1975. The reason, as stated by the union, was that: "The members of the Fire Department benefit by having promotional examinations held on the earliest possible dates in that their retirement and seniority benefits are affected by the length of time that they hold a certain rank. In addition each promotional rank has its own time-in-grade requirement, so the sooner a member is appointed to one rank, the sooner he can advance to the next."

But advancing the examination date as proposed would have disqualified 12 of the City's and Local 55's firefighters including several minority persons whose necessary time-in-grade requirements would not be fulfilled until sometime during the period April 8-29, 1975. The 12 protested so, as stated in the City's brief, "the Board decided to mitigate the hardship by admitting to the examination those persons whose eligibility in terms of service accrued prior to April 29." Three of the 12, including one or more minority persons, passed the examination and were placed on the civil service eligibility list for appointment to the grade of lieutenant.

Local 55 and one Jackson T. Palmer, a white firefighter, thereupon sought the extraordinary writ of mandate in the superior court, contending that the civil service board's grant of eligibility to the 12 to take the examination was arbitrary, capricious and ultra vires. They prayed that the City "remove from the list of persons certified as eligible for promotion to the rank of Lieutenant in the Oakland Fire Department all persons who were ineligible to take the April 8, 1975, Lieutenants' examination."

The Black Fire Fighters Association was permitted to intervene in Local 55's and Palmer's mandate proceeding. It contended then, as it does now, that "Local 55 has not in the past and does not at this time fairly represent the interests of minority members of the Oakland Fire Department and has at all times in the past and in the current action does, in fact, represent positions antagonistic and adverse to all minority members of the Oakland Fire Department, including members of the (Oakland Black Fire Fighters Association)."

It is of significance, as will soon appear, that there had been pending a closely related companion case entitled Glen Hull v. Douglas Cason et al., Alameda Superior Court No. 451337-9, in which minority person firefighters of the City and the Black Fire Fighters Association sought relief on account of racially discriminatory employment practices in the Oakland Fire Department. Among the defendants of that action were "Stephan Menietti, (emphasis added) in his capacity as Fire Chief of the City of Oakland, and his Agents, Subordinates and Employees" and, among the intervenors, Jackson T. Palmer (the latter also being one of the petitioners of the instant mandate proceeding). The Hull v. Cason action was thereafter consolidated for trial, and tried, with the instant mandate proceeding of Palmer and Local 55.

The superior court entered judgment denying the petition of Palmer and Local 55 for mandate, and those parties have appealed. It is that appeal which is presently before us.

Among other things, the superior court had found, and concluded as a matter of law, that the...