At Monday’s (9/19) City Council meeting, community leaders working with Virginia Organizing voiced their concerns about a perceived underrepresentation of minority supervisors in city jobs. They urged Council to review the city’s hiring policies and conduct an anonymous survey asking city employees about barriers that prevent them from moving into department managerial positions.
According to documents obtained by Virginia Organizing, 35 percent of Charlottesville’s 291 public works employees are African American, but only 16 percent are supervisors or managers. The numbers of overall Hispanic employees and supervisors are even lower.
Councilor Kristin Szakos, whose husband is executive director of Virginia Organizing, asked Council to organize a work session around these issues. Outgoing Councilor David Brown said he believed the lack of a viable social environment for young African American professionals is a reason why so many of them leave the city to find work. Check next week’s paper for an update, and see Virginia Organizing’s documentation below, courtesy of a Freedom of Information Act request.