Some Toledo councilmen frustrated by the lack of details about a Toledo Fire and Rescue Department recruit’s recent termination expressed concerns this week about the department’s funding request to help increase diversity in its ranks.
Sierra Adebisi, 28, was fired Aug. 23, hours before her academy class graduated. She said she believes her termination was racially motivated and is the second terminated recruit in two years to accuse the department of racial discrimination.
Several city councilmen during a public safety committee meeting Wednesday said they wished the fire department’s administration had briefed them about Ms. Adebisi’s termination so they could answer the barrage of questions they fielded over the weekend about the incident.
At-large Councilman Cecelia Adams said she attended the graduation ceremony for Fire Class 293 and was surprised to read about Ms. Adebisi’s termination in The Blade the next day.
“Please know that we’re going to be watching this very closely, because it hits particularly the minority members of council very hard when we hear that because we have to answer questions,” Ms. Adams told Toledo Fire Chief Brian Byrd. “Even though it is a personnel issue that you cannot speak about, be sensitive to the fact that we have to speak to people in the public about what happened.”
Councilman Larry Sykes said he was “blindsided” by the news of Ms. Adebisi’s firing. He requested a briefing from the administration about the circumstances that lead to her dismissal, and he also asked officials to compile a report broken down by gender and ethnicity of all fire recruits who were terminated during training or their probationary period under Chief Byrd.
“With the tremendous amounts of money we invest in recruiting, training, equipping, and retaining new and existing employees to the city, and especially the focus on aggressively recruiting women and minorities to join our workforce, the reported events surrounding this matter are particularly disturbing to me,” Mr. Sykes said.
Fire officials two weeks ago requested $59,600 for a two-year contract with Toledo-based vCreative to produce a recruitment campaign to help the department increase diversity in its ranks. The department has since agreed to go out to bid for the work after push back from some city councilmen about the process.
Earl Murry, who is serving as a spokesman for Ms. Adebisi and Major Smith III, who was fired in July, 2018, and is suing the city, said he believes city funds would be better spent investigating why the fire department hasn’t retained all the minority recruits it starts with at the beginning of each fire class.
“The problem isn’t with recruiting, it’s with retention,” he said.
Councilman Yvonne Harper shared Mr. Murry’s sentiment.
“As a black female, how can I justify to spend more money, and everybody’s feeling it right now, if we give this money for recruitment, obviously it’s not going to work because we’re letting individuals go,” she told Chief Byrd on Wednesday. “If we’re going to spend extra dollars for recruitment and it’s not working right now, why should I say ‘yes?’ ”
Chief Byrd told the councilmen that his department is working with the city’s human resources department and officials from the office of diversity and inclusion to improve the methods they use to recruit and retain a diverse and capable group of people into the academy.
“I understand why you have questions, and we’re trying to do what we can do to alleviate the same concerns for the next class,” he said.
Ms. Adams said she believes recruits should have resources available to them if they need extra help during the academy. She said she doesn’t want to see heightened recruitment efforts go to waste if there isn’t a system in place to ensure that most recruits can become full-time firefighters.
“Our efforts, we do not want them to be in vain. We want everybody that’s there, that represents an underrepresented portion, that they get all the help they can. So I’m just seizing this opportunity to impress upon you how important it is for us to help them in any way that they need to be helped,” she said. “And if that help doesn't work, then we need to be able to justify why they didn't make it.”
First Published August 30, 2019, 8:11 p.m.
