THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, June 5, 1995 TAG: 9506050037
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A5 EDITION: FINAL
SERIES: AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
PART TWO
BUSINESS
SOURCE: BY MARGARET EDDS AND KATE FLEMING, STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
About two-thirds of the inmates in the Virginia prison system are African-American.
But at the highest echelon of prison policy-making, the office of the secretary of public safety, the numbers are quite different.
There, the eight-person staff of Secretary Jerry Kilgore is all white.
If the hiring practices of a governor and his cabinet set a tone for minority and female involvement in state government, the record of Republican Gov. George F. Allen and his recent Democratic predecessors suggest that Virginia has a spotty commitment to diversity.
Among Allen's nine Cabinet secretaries, four - the secretaries of public safety, natural resources, commerce and finance - have no minorities on their staff. Four others - secretaries of transportation, health and human resources, administration, and the Commonwealth - have staffs comprised of about one-third or more minorities. Women are generally well represented throughout the secretariats.
Overall, about 16 percent of the 115 members of the staffs of Allen and his Cabinet are minorities. At a comparable point in the administration of former Gov. L. Douglas Wilder, the nation's first elected African-American governor, the figure was about 30 percent. Under former Gov. Gerald L. Baliles, who served from 1986 to 1990, it was 24 percent. Given the makeup of the prison population, perhaps the most noticeable absence of minorities is in the public safety office.
State Sen. Henry L. Marsh, D-Richmond, called the omission ``a tragic commentary on the state of affairs we're now experiencing . . . an example of the failure of government to provide leadership.''
Kilgore's predecessor, O. Randolph Rollins, who served in the Wilder administration, declined to criticize current hiring policies because the office has few employees.
But Rollins said that during much of his tenure, three of his five staff members, including a deputy secretary, were African Americans. He believes a diverse leadership gives government more credibility in serving a diverse public, he said.
``Everybody can't understand the background of everyone else, and we should not assume that we can,'' he said.
Allen spokesman Ken Stroupe countered that a commitment to fairness doesn't have to be reflected in a specific racial configuration. ``That presupposes that to understand a minority you must be of that minority,'' he said.
Stroupe noted that two of five parole board members are African Americans, and that three are women. ``Gov. Allen is committed to diversity within his administration, and that certainly includes diversity of race,'' he said.
While most state government agencies have broadened their pool of employees in recent years, the most notable exception is the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. Of 384 employees in June 1984, all but six were white. None of the department's 29 administrators is a minority. Nineteen percent of the employees are women.
Secretary of Natural Resources Becky Norton Dunlop said it's a mystery why so few minorities have applied for jobs in the department despite an aggressive recruitment effort. ILLUSTRATION: SALARIES COMPARED
Staff graphics by JOHN EARLE
SOURCE: The Virginian-Pilot computer analysis of state persronnel
records.
CHART
Average salaries of state government workers by race and sex.
[For a copy of the chart, see microfilm for this date.]
KEYWORDS: AFFIRMATIVE ACTION by CNB