FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CR TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 1997 (202) 616-2765 TDD (202) 514-1888 JUSTICE DEPARTMENT ALLEGES GENDER DISCRIMINATION BY PHILADELPHIA TRANSIT POLICE WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Justice Department today sued the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) for discriminating against female transit police applicants by requiring them to meet fitness standards that are unrelated to successful job performance. The suit, filed today in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia, charges that SEPTA violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by requiring female applicants to meet standards of fitness that have no bearing upon successful job performance, and which serve to exclude qualified women from becoming transit police officers. "The Department of Justice is committed to ensuring that law enforcement agencies use hiring procedures that are job-related and select the most qualified candidates," said Isabelle Katz Pinzler, Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. "Women have the right to an equal opportunity to compete for jobs using job-related selection procedures that are fair and unbiased." According to the Department's complaint, when SEPTA administered the physical fitness test in October 1993, none of the female applicants completed it successfully. The complaint asserts that alternative testing methods exist that can better predict how successful someone will perform on the job and which do not discriminate on the basis of sex. The Department asked the court to enter an order requiring SEPTA to replace the discriminatory tests with lawful ones, and to provide offers of employment, back pay, remedial seniority and other employment benefits to women who have been affected by the discrimination. ### 97-070