PDF: Dept of Education
Just as litigation is heating up in a reverse race discrimination lawsuit four years in the making against the Chattanooga Police Department, the county Department of Education is facing similar charges of favoring minorities to the detriment of whites.
Former Tyner Academy assistant principal Kenneth Wilhoite, in a lawsuit filed in Hamilton County Chancery Court, claims he was demoted in February 2009 “because he was not a minority.”
Mr. Wilhoite is seeking unspecified damages.
A separate lawsuit against the police department, which could go to trial this year, claims supervisors froze promotions in 2005 because of the belief that the testing process used to pinpoint promotion candidates was a disadvantage to blacks.
Attorney Eric Burnette, who represents Mr. Wilhoite, said he expects Hamilton County Schools to use the excuse that several assistant principals across the district were demoted at the same time as Mr. Wilhoite because of budget cuts.
Tyner principal Carol Gross, however, then told Mr. Wilhoite that “she could not keep him because he was not a minority,” the lawsuit states.
That’s the kind of “direct evidence” that is rare in any race-based discrimination case, Mr. Burnette said Tuesday.
Mr. Burnette speculated that the school system could argue that, because Tyner Academy is a mostly black school, the decision was made that the assistant principal should be black as well.
“But race is never a bona fide occupational qualification,” Mr. Burnette said. “The courts are clear on that.”
Schools spokeswoman Danielle Clark declined to discuss the case Tuesday.
“It would not be proper since the case is in litigation,” Ms. Clark said.
Among other allegations in the lawsuit is that, after Mr. Wilhoite was demoted, he eventually lost his job in favor of younger assistant principals who were vying for new positions after being demoted because of budget cuts.
Two weeks ago, a Hamilton County jury awarded two former Chattanooga deputy chiefs more than $500,000 for age discrimination on the part of the police department.