Carson to Investigate Charges by NAACP
Carson officials plan to investigate charges raised by the NAACP this week that the city keeps blacks out of top decision-making posts in City Hall through discriminatory hiring practices.
Councilwoman Sylvia Muise has requested that an agenda item be prepared for an upcoming council meeting that will refer the complaints to the city’s Human Relations Commission and order that group to report back to the council.
“The city has not yet investigated the charges raised by the NAACP,” Muise said in an interview Thursday. “I am concerned about what is perceived by some as racism in City Hall. If there is a perception, we have an obligation to look at that.”
About 30 black demonstrators, many of them members of the Carson branch of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, held a march and rally before Tuesday’s council meeting to protest the lack of black directors in City Hall and an environment that they say is hostile toward blacks. There are two vacancies among the city’s seven department heads, and protesters urged the city to fill at least one of them with a qualified black.
Mayor Michael Mitoma disputed the NAACP’s assertions and said he plans to resign as a member of the local chapter because of its charges of racism.
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