Brooklyn Federal Court Judge Nicholas Garaufis yesterday appointed himself de facto New York City fire commissioner for the next decade — and maybe longer.
In a ruling remarkable even by Garaufis’ imperious standards, the jurist declared that the city has deliberately excluded minority firefighters from the FDNY’s ranks — and announced plans to appoint a monitor answerable only to him to oversee all aspects of the FDNY’s hiring, training and promotion “for at least the next 10 years.”
The decision was entirely expected; Garaufis’ animus toward the department has been obvious from the moment he began hearing this case four years ago.
Stipulated, the FDNY has an unusually low number of black and Hispanic firefighters.
In Garaufis’ head, this translates into proof of intentional, and illegal, racial discrimination — even if there was not an iota of proof regarding actual discrimination.
The fact is, years of litigation have scrubbed FDNY entrance exams free of any possible bias.
But for ideologues such as Garaufis, such inconvenient facts mean nothing. He sees what he terms “disparate impact” on minorities — so there must be discrimination somewhere.
So the judge set out to find some.
He ordered a so-called bench trial — in which he alone would be judge, jury, prosecutor and, as of yesterday, executioner.
“The clear evidence of disparate impact that Mayor Bloomberg and his senior leadership chose to ignore was obvious to anyone else who looked,” Garaufis haughtily intoned.
“Instead of facing hard facts and asking hard questions about the city’s abysmal track record of hiring black and Hispanic firefighters, the Bloomberg administration dug in and fought back.”
Translation: City Hall, charged with the daunting responsibility of protecting the lives and property of New Yorkers, refused to acquiesce to Garaufis’ demand that it effectively adopt a quota system for hiring firefighters.
Imagine that.
Yes, the FDNY’s hiring practices probably can — and should — be improved.
The department has already successfully ratcheted up its recruitment efforts in minority communities.
But Garaufis’ principal charge — “the FDNY has not remained segregated-in-fact for over 40 years by accident” — remains unproved.
City Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo yesterday vowed to “appeal as soon as [possible].”
That goes without saying.
The safety of the city demands it.