tory time (hour for hour) for 231 hours; when I left October 31, I had 21 hours for which I had received nothing. My immediate superior, the president of the company, said that due to my background and experience and training, I should not have any trouble in finding another equally satisfactory job. But little does he apparently know (or care) what I am up against, when 85 percent of all ads for the good positions specify an age barrier of, say, up to 35, and oftentimes, 30. So, it seems that I have been "let out to pasture" at a time when there is such a need everywhere for proven, competent persons, and when I feel I am doing my best work. We older, more mature employees have so much to offer a company. Besides my experience in private industry, I had 10 years service in the diplomatic field in Foreign Service and 61⁄2 years of civil service in Washington. Mr. Roosevelt, anything you and your committees can do to help bring about much-needed laws to prevent discrimination due to so-called age will be much appreciated by me and countless others like me who also must eat and live. We are behind your efforts 100 percent. DEAR CONGRESSMAN ROOSEVELT: I appreciate very much your sending me the transcript of the testimony of Perry C. Parks, Jr., and Oscar H. York, both employees of the Los Angeles Post Office, who appeared before your subcommittee when you were holding hearings in Los Angeles. I am also appreciative of the opportunity to insert this letter in the record. It is unfortunate, indeed, that the only Los Angeles Post Office employees invited to testify were two disgruntled employees who are the type of extremists President Kennedy deplored on his recent visit here. It would appear that the sole purpose of these two men is to stir racism in a place where it has not existed and to poison the minds of other Negroes with continual cries of discrimination. Since there are more than 10,500 employees in this office, the testimony of these two constitutes a very small sampling of opinion. I emphatically deny that discrimination against the Negro race, or any other minority group, exists in the Los Angeles Post Office, nor will I countenance discrimination of any nature. There are actually two promotional plans in the Post Office Department. The first plan establishes a supervisory eligibility roster. The first examination was held in 1953 and these examinations are held approximately every 2 years. When first established, postmasters were permitted to pick anyone on the eligibility list. To accomplish fair and equitable selection of the best qualified, this office obtained evaluations from two of each eligible's immediate supervisors, and careful consideration was given to their selection. When the present administration came into power, the system of selection from the entire register was changed so that the order of consideration depended upon the score made in the examination, plus credits for years of service and work evaluation. The other plan involves the promotion to higher level or preferred assignments of persons who are already in supervisory positions. This plan originated in the Los Angeles Post Office and has been in effect during my entire tenure of office. It received commendation from postal supervisors in every section of the country, and was widely acclaimed as being a fair plan for promotion. In some highly political offices in other sections of the country, it was considered utopian. The National Association of Postal Supervisors adopted resolutions commending me at State and National conventions, and their national magazine carried an honorroll of other post offices which adopted the plan. After 8 years of operation in the Los Angeles Post Office, Postmaster General Day adopted the plan this year and made it a regulation of the Post Office Department on a nationwide basis. The whole purpose of the plan was to make promotions of the best qualified persons without regard to color, religion, political affiliation, or national origin. I am satisfied that this has been achieved, and the great majority of our supervisors believe this, too. While the entire testimony of the two employees is fraught with half-truths, misstatements and falsehoods, I shall elaborate on only a few of the items: (1) Mr. Parks stated that of three Negro women appointed to supervisory positions, two of them were appointed through the efforts of the National Alliance of Postal Employees and Joseph Clarke, a Negro who was Special Assistant to an Assistant Postmaster General during Mr. Summerfield's administration of the Post Office Department. This statement is false. No person has ever been promoted during my tenure of office through influence of special interest groups, and Mr. Clarke never made any request for the promotion of any Negro woman. To set the record straight, Mr. Clarke did ask me to promote Perry C. Parks, Jr., but I could not conscientiously do so. All appointments to supervisory positions in this office are based on merit, and the guiding factor is the evaluation made by the employee's immediate supervisor. (2) Mr. Parks stated that one Negro woman supervisor is a Phi Beta Kappa. This statement is false. Examination of the personnel records fail to reveal a Phi Beta Kappa among the Negro women supervisors, and I doubt that this information would be the kind anyone of them would conceal. No reference has ever been made by any of the Negro women supervisors on applications for promotion indicating she was a Phi Beta Kappa. (3) Mr. Parks made an issue of the Negro employee who was No. 13 on the supervisory eligibility list but failed to attain a promotion. What Mr. Parks did not say was that he, Perry C. Parks, Jr., was No. 13, that he had been interviewed by two separate promotion panels, one of which had a Negro member, and failed to gain their approval. He also did not say that he was frankly informed by the panels that he was a below-average employee, and he failed to acknowledge that the panels picked five other Negroes for promotion. (4) Mr. Parks stated that 40 people were interviewed to select 6 persons for promotion, and that the 40 had to be interviewed in order to reach down to persons acceptable to the panelists. This statement is false. Actually, a number of persons eliminated themselves by refusal to accept night work, which is office policy for beginners, and others in the Postal Transportation Service were eliminated by a departmental ruling restricting their promotions to their own branch of the Service. In all matters of promotion, the Postmaster General's orders are adhered to with meticulous care, and Mr. Parks was grasping thin air when he made the charge. (5) Mr. Parks stated that one other person who suffered discrimination was a Jew. Mr. Parks was not present when that person was interviewed and, therefore, could not know that the other person was pointedly asked if he felt he could assume the duties of management, and he replied that he doubted that he could. (6) Mr. Parks stated there were no Negro supervisors in a position higher than PFS-11, and there were no Negro supervisors in our general accounting section. While this is true at the moment, there had previously been two Negro supervisors in general accounting. One was required to return to the Division of Mails because of lack of seniority during a reduction in force in general accounting. The other bid into a higher position in the Division of Mails, eventually became third in command, a PFS-13, in that Division. Ths year, Postmaster General Day selected him to be a Deputy Assistant Postmaster General, and he holds this position in the Department in Washington. The other person to give testimony was Oscar H. York. At the time of his appearance before the committee, he was under charges because of continued absenteeism and tardiness, and was undoubtedly venting his anger. His testimony was so nebulous that I find nothing worthy of comment. While it did not appear in the testimony, he was also angered at being denied permission to attend school under the GI bill, as he did not meet the basic requirement of the Post Office Department that an employee requesting such permission must have been on the rolls before entering the military service. Mr. York entered the postal service on November 1, 1946, resigned April 30, 1947, and later met the requirements through a civil service examination and reentered the service on March 21, 1949. It should be pointed out that it requires a considerable length of time to attain top ranking in the postal service. Most of our executives in the Los Angeles Post Office have from 30 to 45 years of service. The Negro mentioned before, who is now Deputy Assistant Postmaster General, entered the Los Angeles Post Office on May 11, 1923. He was the first Negro in this office ever to be appointed a supervisor and that was in 1935. The great influx of Negroes into the Los Angeles Post Office did not begin until after World War II and the fact that we now have 82 Negro supervisors in levels from PFS-7 to PFS-11 would indicate that the Negro has made marked progress in the Los Angeles Post Office. While the Negro deplores the slow progress, so do hundreds of employees of all other races. At the present time, there are in excess of 800 eligibles on the supervisory promotion register, and some 600 supervisors in this office. The Los Angeles Post Office is reputedly a garden spot for persons of minority groups. Here they know that equal opportunity exists, and that advancement is made upon the basis of merit performance. The Los Angeles Post Office ranks high in efficiency. My own personal reputation for fair dealing over a period of more than 40 years in the business, civic, and cultural world of Los Angeles is not a responsibility that I take lightly, and I certainly would never take any action to jeopardize it. Sincerely, OTTO K. OLESEN, Postmaster. NATIONAL ALLIANCE OF POSTAL EMPLOYEES, Mr. JAMES ROOSEVELT, Congressman, House Office Building, DEAR SIR: I am enclosing some additional material which I hope will be of some help in your investigation. (1) I am sending this copy of the agenda which was used in a conference with representatives of the Civil Service Commission. This will point up some areas in which investigations may prove revealng. Mr. Peter Resty made the investigations for the Civil Service Commission. His entire report on the Los Angeles Post Office's personnel practices should prove interesting. (2) Statement made to the postal inspectors by Henry Gibson, president of the Los Angeles Branch of the National Alliance of Postal Employees and myself on the Monday, October 30, following the Los Angeles hearing October 27. (3) List of promotions for years 1958, 1959, and 1960, with a recap on last page showing ethnic breakdown. I have not completed the analysis as yet. (4) List of applications for promotion of George Roscoe Jones, a man who has the seniority, qualifications, and has many times seen men with less seniority and qualifications promoted over him. This is just a sample others are available if you need them. (5) This letter indicates the decision reached by the regional office after a discussion with Mr. Albert Bergesen, regional personnel director, Roy Hogan, special assistant for employee relations, Henry Gibson, president, Los Angeles Branch of National Alliance of Postal Employees, and myself. We feel that the parts of the report, which were sustained indicate incompetence and inability to follow instructions. (6) This statement by Mr. Smith, president of National Alliance Postal Employees, supports our statement at the hearing. Mr. Smith's address is 1644 11th Street NW., Washington 1, D.C. (7) Letter from Postmaster Olesen in answer to my letter requesting specific reasons in detail as to why I was passed over for promotion, inasmuch as the first letter was vague and not to the point. This letter is still not specific, the main point was that they felt that my voice is to low. The assistant general superintendent of mails stated that I did a disservice to the post office by testifying before the committee, that I should have squashed such beliefs rather than expose them. He further stated that he knew discrimination existed some years back, but there was none now. I have been interviewed twice for promotion, once before the hearing and once after. In the first instance I was interviewed for about 5 minutes, and in the second, for 1 hour. We feel that a look at the records of the promotion Advisory Board will produce some revealing facts. This letter indicates that no consideration was given to the evaluation by my immediate supervisor, my rating on the examination and 24 years of seniority. It is hoped that this information will be of some help and if there is any thing I can do just let me know. Sincerely yours, PERRY C. PArks, Jr., AGENDA: MEETING WITH REPRESENTATIVES OF CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION AND REPRESENTATIVES OF NATIONAL ALLIANCE OF POSTAL EMPLOYEES The purpose of this meeting is to bring into focus some of the areas in which personnel management as practiced in the Los Angeles Post Office may be improved, so that the operation of the office may be carried on under conditions satisfactory to management and employees. I. Selection process of new employees. A. Lack of training of interviewers. C. Rule of one in three. II. Employee development. A. Maintenance Department. 1. Failure to train old employees. 2. Favoritism in promotions. 3. Lack of a comprehensive training program. B. Clerical. 1. Preferred assignments issued without uniformity. 2. Clerk-stenographer positions should be bid within the office before outsiders are brought in off the list. 3. Lack of knowledge of personnel with special talents. 4. Special talents in office not utilized. C. Supervisors. 1. Talents and skills of supervisors are not utilized to the best interest of the service. 2. Establish relations with universities so as to develop a formal training program. 3. Encourage participation in professional societies. III. Promotion plan. A. Elimination of the review board. 1. Too subjective. 2. Negates the validity of the written examination and the performance evaluation as well as seniority. B. Assign weights to the decision of the board. IV. Staffing the personnel section. A. Personnel office understaffed. B. Lack of professional training by members of staff. C. Lack of coordination between personnel office and operational personnel practices at terminal annex. NOVEMBER 3, 1961. STATEMENT OF LOS ANGELES BRANCH, NATIONAL ALLIANCE POSTAL EMPLOYEES, REGARDING DISCRIMINATION IN LOS ANGELES POST OFFICE It is the belief of this organization that there is discrimination in the allotment of preferred assignments and in the promotion to supervisor as well as the upgrading of supervisors. The offense is one of omission rather than commission. A survey of the various stations in the city will reveal that Negro supervisors are assigned to stations in predominantly Negro communities. In bidding on these assignments, a pattern has developed which shows that when there is a number of years of service on the part of the applicant, he is not suitable; and, on the other hand, when the applicant is highly qualified, it is stated that he does not have the seniority. At terminal annex, where the bulk of the employees work and an overwhelming majority of the employees are Negro, there are only two level 9 supervisors out of a total force of 24 or over, and above level 9 there are none. In the specialized offices such as personnel, general accounting, postal services, cost ascertainment, there are no Negroes. This is not because they are not qualified, for a comparison of the qualifications of these holding the positions and the Negroes applying, will show that the Negro has the higher qualifications. In the mechanical unit where 75 percent of the employees are Negro, there is only one supervisor. An example of the disregard for fairness is vividly shown in the case of William Gallerson, who was denied promotion to working leader of postal machine mechanics. Gallerson was No. 1 on the list. The position was given to a Caucasian, who the authorities stated was given the position because he knew electronics. Upon investigation, it was found that he not only had less seniority, but was trained by Gallerson and had received no training whatsover in electronics. It might be just a coincidence that the person who received the appointment has a brother who is a supervisor. The bidding records of Lucille Ashford and Roscoe Jones are examples of the well qualified, and the senior persons being denied promotion. It is our belief that the intent of the Department is to have the best qualified person in the position and if qualifications are the same, then seniority is the deciding factor. This policy was not carried out in the filling of the position of general clerk, foreign records unit, air mail facility, a level 5 position. Clerk Tsukahira who was No. 2 on the list according to the specifications of the job, was passed over and the No. 4 man was chosen. Clerk Tsukahira did not receive an interview, which is an indication that he was not considered. The Postal Laws and Regulations state that the person in the level nearest the position sought should be considered first. It has been reported to this organization that Mr. Stead, the superintendent, wanted the No. 4 man because he was presently working in the position on detail. There is a general feeling in this office at the administrative level, that the post office is no place for a person with a college education. This point is exemplified in the case of Andrew Bryant, who after having been turned down on a transfer from the Atlanta Office, took the examination, was called for an interview and told that with his education he could do better outside the post office. After waiting several days, he inquired as to why he was not chosen and was told, he would never know, but he was turned down on the one out of three rule. Bryant went back to the clerk who was working on his transfer and complained of unfair treatment. He was given a temporary subclerk assignment, worked one year and was made a regular subclerk. Mr. Bryant had done graduate work at Atlanta University. This type of philosophy not only down grades the post office but perpetuates mediocrity in the postal service. This statement is not an attempt to accuse any particular person. As an organization, we have found that irrespective of regulations and decrees setting forth merit and ability as the basic standards for promotion and assignment, the activation and interpretation applied is often at variance with the intent. Therefore, we are hoping this discourse will help to clear the atmosphere so that the policies as presented by Postmaster General Day and the Department can be implemented in such a way that equal opportunity can exist for all. PERRY C. PARKS, Vice President 10th District, President, Los Angeles Branch, National Alliance Postal Employees. 77736-62-pt. 2- -23 |