WSW EDITORIAL

By Loretta Feller

At a recent seminar ominously titled "Is Affirmative Action Dead?" sponsored by the Council on Human Relations, Clevelanders heard the theories of two men responsi-

News

National

Vol. 7; no. 5

ble for the impending changes in national affirmative action policy. Stephen Markman, Chief Counsel for the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, in which a constitutional amendment banning affirmative action has been introduced, told the audience that affirmative

6-7

CONTENTS

Viewpoints... Bits & Pieces... Find It Fastest.......

..5,7 ....back cover

..3

Classified Ads... What's Happening..

.11

Working Women: Defending Affirmative Action..4 Local

Do Cleveland's CETA Programs Benefit Women?.3 Ohio Schools: Vocational Ed Inequities........ Wanda Jacobs: Police Protection?...

Cover Photograph by Janet Century

What She Wants

.9-11

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action had nothing to do with civil rights, was immoral, and damaged the self-esteem of those it meant to help.

Jay Parker, a conservative black man who directed 'Reagan's transition team on the EEOC, also spoke. His report alleged that affirmative action had "created a new racism in America". When asked about particulars of dismantling affirmative action by a woman Cleveland Women Working member, he evaded answering by accusing the "guys" at CWW of not being serious when focusing on others in a position to hire and fire. Rather, he argued, they should do what he did to sidestep discrimination, which was to go into business for himself.

Less than two weeks after the seminar, the administration issued its proposals for lessening affirmative action requirements for companies holding government contracts. If put into effect (a mandatory 60-day public comment period applies), the changes to the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) would allow 145,000 companies employing nearly 7,000,000 people to go without written plans that commit them to concrete goals and timetables (The New York Times, August 27, 1981). Also, the changes would loosen hiring and promotion standards and would weaken sexual harassment and pregnancy rules, alterations which Mr. Parker had also recommended for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). In fact, the EEOC issued a letter to Ellen Shong, Reagan's newly appointed Director of the OFCCP, which noted the inconsistencies with EEOC guidelines on sexual harassment, pregnancy discrimination, and sex-segregated seniority systems. Some of the new provisions "could mask underutilization or discrimination" and "have a chilling effect on affirmative action".

In addition to the objections raised by the government's lead EEO agency and by some high-level officials at the OFCCP itself, Cleveland Women Working has launched its own campaign to defend affirmative action. A CWW group of about 50 demonstrated at the Federal Building, holding signs and singing, and then proceeded to the OFCCP office where they presented their demands to Howard Morley, OFCCP Area Director. Calling for the OFCCP not to reduce the number of companies covered by the regulations, they also demanded that back pay be kept as an enforcement tool. CWW had received word that OFCCP officials in Washington had placed an indefinite hold on cases involving back pay; they insisted that the agency continue to pursue the cases involving back pay which CWW had filed against National City Bank, Central National, Union Commerce, and Broadview Savings. They also demanded that OFCCP Director Ellen Shong come to CWW's public hearing in Cleveland on September 30 (5:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the City Club) to find out from the people who suffer from discrimination why strong affirmative action enforcement is still needed.

More than fifteen years have passed since current civil rights laws were introduced in this country, yet occupational segregation by race and sex is still rampant. Wages for historically segregated jobs continue to be among the lowest in the country because a systematically discriminatory "free market" continues to force us to choose between a low salary or no salary at all. While women's share of professional and technical occupations has declined from 45 to 39 percent, and women are still earning 59 cents for every dollar earned by a man, the administration now proposes to gut its only program addressing these inequities.

Comments on the proposed changes must be made by mid-October. Write to James W. Cisco, Acting Director, Division of Program Policy, Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, U.S. Department of Labor, Washington, D.C. Send letters in support of affirmative action to Raymond Donovan, Secretary of Labor (same address), and to President Reagan at the White House. Also, CWW urges people who have directly benefited from affirmative action programs to contact them at 566-8511 about testifying at their hearing on September 30.

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Application to mail at second class postage rates is pending at Cleveland, Ohio. What She Wants is published monthly except August and February. Yearly subscription rates are $6 (individual), $10 (non-profit organization), 515 (profit organization), $15 (contributing) and $25 (sustaining). What She Wants is published by What She Wants, Inc., P.O. Box 18465, Cleveland Heights, Ohio 44118..

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September, 1981/What She Wants/Pap