Barrett v. United States Civil Service Commission

69 F.R.D. 544, 11 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 1089, 21 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 521, 1975 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14885, 10 Empl. Prac. Dec. (CCH) 10,586
CourtDistrict Court, District of Columbia
DecidedDecember 10, 1975
DocketCiv. A. No. 74-1694
StatusPublished
Cited by26 cases

This text of 69 F.R.D. 544 (Barrett v. United States Civil Service Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, District of Columbia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Barrett v. United States Civil Service Commission, 69 F.R.D. 544, 11 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 1089, 21 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 521, 1975 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14885, 10 Empl. Prac. Dec. (CCH) 10,586 (D.D.C. 1975).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION

RICHEY, District Judge.

This is an employment discrimination action brought by federal employees under the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972 (EEOA), Pub.L. 92-261, 86 Stat. 103 et seq., which amends Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq. (1970), and extends procedural protections to federal employees complaining of employment discrimination. Jurisdiction is conferred, inter alia, by 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-16(c). Named plaintiffs Sylvester Barrett, a black man, and Gloria A. Williams, a black woman, are employees at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Johnson Space Center (hereinafter, NASA-JSC) at Houston, Texas. Each claims to be a victim of race discrimination, and plaintiff Williams alleges additionally that she is a victim of sex discrimination. In their complaint, plaintiffs also allege that systemic discrimination against blacks and women exists at NASA-JSC. Accordingly, they seek to represent, in a class action brought pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 23(b) (2), all black and female employees of NASA-JSC who have been denied promotions on the basis of the alleged discriminatory practices and all black and female applicants for employment at NASA-JSC who have been refused employment on the basis of said challenged practices. Plaintiffs seek, for themselves and for the proposed classes, injunctive relief, employment promotions, back pay, and attorneys’ fees.

Plaintiffs also challenge the regulatory scheme of the Civil Service Commission which, they allege, does not allow for the simultaneous processing and consideration of complaints of class and individual discrimination. On behalf of a proposed class of all persons who file complaints of systemic discrimination against agencies of the United States pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq., plaintiffs seek a declaratory judgment that the defendant’s policy of refusing to process, consider and resolve complaints of class and systemic discrimination advanced through individual complaints of discrimination is unlawful.

These proceedings had their genesis on the administrative level. Early in 1974, each plaintiff filed a formal complaint of discrimination with NASA, pursuant to Civil Service Commission regulations designed to carry out the mandate of the above-mentioned pertinent portions of the Civil Rights Act. The complaints were filed not only on behalf of the individual complainants, but also on behalf of certain classes of employees who, according to the complaints, were affected by the alleged discrimination. The agency accepted for consideration the complaints of discrimination as to the individual complainants, but refused to consider the complaints as to allegations of class discrimination because they were not presented to the agency in compliance with Civil Service Commission regulations. (The Civil Service Commission regulatory scheme, discussed in greater detail herein, provides, essentially, for the independent consideration of allega[547]*547tions of individual and class discrimination.) Complainants appealed the agency’s failure to consider the class aspects of their complaints to the Board of Appeals and Review of the Civil Service Commission. The Board upheld the agency’s decision in October of 1974. Meanwhile, the individual complaints of discrimination were not resolved on the agency level. The complaint in this, action was filed on November 20,1974, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-16(c), which authorizes a civil suit in federal court within 30 days of final agency action on a complaint or, if the agency fails to take final action, 180 days after the complaint is filed with the agency.

The case is currently before the Court on four motions. The defendant-government has moved to remand this action to the agency and has also moved to dismiss portions of the complaint relating to the plaintiffs’ challenge to an allegedly discriminatory pre-employment test, the Professional Admissions Career Examination (PACE).1 Defendants have moved for a declaratory judgment with respect to the Civil Service regulatory scheme, discussed above, and for certification of this action as a class action with the plaintiffs representing the classes proposed in their complaint and substantive pleadings.

I. Motion to Remand.

The government admits that this civil action was filed more than 180 days after the plaintiffs originally filed complaints with the agency. Nevertheless, the government would have this Court remand this action to the agency for a full exhaustion of named plaintiffs’ administrative remedies. The government claims that, since the early part of 1975, plaintiffs have been unwilling to accommodate the agency’s reasonable efforts to resolve these matters. It is perhaps unfair to accuse the plaintiffs, as does the government, of “intransigence” with respect to delay on the administrative level. First, the delay was due, essentially, to an apparently good-faith dispute (the merits of which are not before the Court) as to whether the complainants have a right to discovery on the administrative level. Second, the dispute and subsequent delay arose after the 180-day period had passed and plaintiffs had initiated this action.2 In any case, this Court is of the opinion that the instant situation is governed by the recent decision of Grubbs v. Butz, 514 F.2d 1323 (D.C.Cir.1975). In Grubbs, Chief Judge Bazelon, for a unanimous panel, wrote:

“The 180 day provision represents a Congressional determination that providing prompt access to the courts in discrimination disputes is so important that the administrative process will be given only a finite time to deal alone with a given dispute. Indeed, the Act is in part a response to Congressional realization that ‘the doctrine of exhaustion of remedies . . . [548]*548had become [a] barrier to meaningful court review.’ Requiring a complainant to further pursue administrative remedies after fulfilling all the prerequisites to suit specified by the EEOA and, most importantly, after 180 days have elasped without final administrative action, would frustrate that response.
No appellate court has yet superimposed an exhaustion requirement on the statutory prerequisites to suit as set out in § 717(c). And, recently, our District Court in Williams v. Mumford, 5 FEP Cases 1042 (D.D.C.1973), held that, regardless of the availability of any further administrative remedy, a federal employee has a right to file a civil action under § 717(c) if final agency action has not been taken within the 180 day period.
Nor does the addition of a further exhaustion requirement to § 717(c) find support in the cases interpreting the analogous part of Title VII dealing with private employees’ rights of action in discrimination eases. In McDonnell Douglas v. Green,

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Bluebook (online)
69 F.R.D. 544, 11 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 1089, 21 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 521, 1975 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14885, 10 Empl. Prac. Dec. (CCH) 10,586, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/barrett-v-united-states-civil-service-commission-dcd-1975.