City Employees Blast Civil Rights Office Reorganization

Nelson Linder, president of the local chapter of the NAACP, speaks with city employees and labor leaders at a press conference opposing the reorganization of the Civil Rights Office (Photo by Lina Fisher)

Last week, the city employees union and the local chapter of the NAACP held a press conference at the shared building of the NAACP and the city Civil Rights Office, criticizing Inter­im City Manager Jesús Garza's proposal to consolidate three offices – the Equity Office, the Office of Civil Rights, and the Small and Minority Business Resources office – into one.

More than 50 organizations, including the city employees union AFSCME Local 1624, Austin Justice Coalition, Grassroots Leadership, and more, signed a statement opposing the move, stressing that these offices were created to be autonomous and to report directly to the city manager. They ask: "How can these offices do their job without the autonomy and authority they need? How can they hold other offices accountable when their status is demoted beneath those departments?" During Council budget sessions over the past month, many organizations expressed that the move seems like a deprioritization of diversity, equity, and inclusion, at a time when the state and the nation are legally rolling back those initiatives.

Garza has defended the change, writing in a memo July 31, "In actuality, the creation of a strong department focused on all things related to equity and civil rights should solidify the City's stance on … these critically important functions." He further urged that the move "will in no way diminish the existing offices." Each will be a distinct unit under the new department, and the Equity Office will remain in the same building as the NAACP local headquarters on East 11th Street, while the OCR and SMBR will relocate to the One Texas Center. Garza notes that other cities, including Dallas, Ft. Worth, and San Antonio, have consolidated civil rights-­related departments and that this change will "achieve better efficiency and effectiveness."

Without an autonomously visible OCR, city employees fear human resources will handle the lion's share of discrimination complaints. AFSCME's Krissy O'Brien stressed, "We have been through the investigation process with internal HR. And it is not a good outcome." Sandra Greene, a former Austin Energy employee who recently won $750,000 from the city after filing an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint alleging discrimination and subsequent retaliation from her boss, spoke against the change. In her case, the jury found that the city's HR department referred her back to Austin Energy's HR section rather than doing its own investigation. Greene said in the presser, "Had the Civil Rights Office existed when my situation occurred [back in 2016], I would have had an avenue to go to; I may not have entered into a legal situation."

Employees also view the decision as part of a larger pattern in the administration of the city manager making decisions without transparency: "This administration is way out of touch; they don't talk to people to make decisions," said NAACP President Nelson Linder. Garza said in city budget work sessions that the proposed reorganization will allow administrators to set goals and priorities, rather than those coming out of community engagement sessions. "There's a bigger issue here," said Linder.

AFSCME's business manager Carol Guth­rie stresses that the consolidation will open the city to more lawsuits like Greene's: "Obviously, none of us like suing the city of Austin. But when you're being discriminated against and or retaliated against, at the end of the day, that's the only avenue that some employees have. And if we bury the Civil Rights Office, the employees again will have no place to go, and it will result in more lawsuits against the city instead of trying to work these things out and get a good fair compromise for both parties."