Council Initiates Study on Racial Diversity in County Government

County legislators pledged Monday by resolution to scrutinize the county government’s workforce to ensure minorities are equally represented.

The resolution was forwarded by Councilman Daryl Jones (D-1st District) and Chris Trumbauer (D-6th District) and was later passed unanimously by the rest of the council.

The legislation requests an internal report of the racial and gender makeup of county government employees to ensure equal representation.

Jones led the charge at Monday night’s council meeting, saying a closer watch needed to be made over just who the county employs.

“I think that would be a good step going forward for this council—to sit and review and do an analysis as to where we are as a county,” Jones said.

Alan Friedman, the director of government relations for County Executive John Leopold, said that the information being requested was public information. He introduced a panel of speakers who presented documentation of the racial makeup of county employees.

The county’s personnel director, Andrea Fulton, said some of their data wasn't updated, but concluded that the racial diversity among employees was proportional to the demographics in the county’s population.

When pressed by Councilman Dick Ladd (R-5th District) on whether there was any particular department that had a racial imbalance, Fulton said the police department has vacancies that need to be filled. Keeping the racial makeup balanced while also trying to fill the rosters has become a challenge, she said.

“I do think that’s an area we’re working on, and trying to improve. Sworn police officers are a hard position to fill at this point,” she said.

Yevola Peters, a special assistant to the county executive on human relations and minority affairs, noted that they had been working with the chiefs of the police and fire departments on the issue of diversity for more than a year.

“The fire department and police department are probably the lower ones in terms of the diversity profile,” Peters said.

After the presentation, the floor was turned over to the public. More than a dozen African-Americans in the audience testified in favor of Jones’ legislation. Many of those who spoke are community leaders or public officials themselves, such as Eugene Peterson, a member of the Anne Arundel County Board of Education.

Peterson applauded the resolution, but challenged the councilmen to do the work of implementing solid changes.

“Where the rubber meets the road is, how do you make it happen?” Peterson asked. “I believe each of you has a responsibility to do what you can to ensure the playing field is employment and contracting is a level one."

Peterson said the school board struggled with the issue, and came up with some policies that are in place today that mitigate the problems. He outlined some of them to the council.

Clay Street resident Robert Eades said action like this is long overdue. He said he’s witnessed firsthand hiring policies that he called “straight-up racism” in the county.

“I see a system of institutionalized racism,” Eades said. “It’s time for people of color to get their fair share.”

The council later voted unanimously in favor of the resolution.