EPA Black Specialist Who Won $600,000 Anti-Bias Stat Now Helps Co-Workers

Determined to rid discrimination from the work policies of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Washington, D.C., Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo went to federal court and in August won the biggest verdict ever awarded against the agency in a bias lawsuit--$600,000.

Now she helps other colleagues within the ranks organize and press bias claims in the agency.

Coleman-Adebayo has appeared at several rallies held by the workers to present a solid front in opposition to alleged discrimination at the agency.

In the EPA work force she is considered "a heroine" who has stood out for her uncompromising attitude. She recently testified about her struggles at the agency during a hearing of the House Committee on Science, and was seated next to EPA Administrator Carol M. Browner.

Coleman-Adebayo, who holds a doctorate in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), started work at the EPA as an African affairs specialist in 1990.

She was later appointed executive secretary for the environmental committee of the Gore-Mbeki Commission, a binational agency headed by Vice President Al Gore and South African President Thabo Mbeki. She also directed EPA's program, arranging the World Women's Conference in Beijing in 1995.

However, she was removed from her Commission post and other posts related to her field of expertise and subjected to increasing amounts of racial harassment and slurs, as well as passed over for promotions, according to press reports.

The jury ruled that when she filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, she was retaliated against with reduced assignments.

In filing her bias suit, she exposed tactics employed against Black women at the agency. She explained then that at one time, "We had a Black employee who was told to clean up the toilet on a trip for Mrs. Carol M. Browner (the EPA administrator)."

She warned, "We have people in Georgia, New York and California with serious racial problems."

More than 150 Black employees have claimed job bias and filed a class-action suit against the agency, an action which was approved by EPA's Victims of Racial Discrimination, a group co-founded by Selwyn Cox and Dr. Coleman-Adebayo.

During the hearing, EPA administrator Browner was told by committee chair Rep. James Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin "to clean up the mess at EPA before the start of a new administration."