Associations Denounce Federal Official's Comments Concerning Hispanic Underrepresentation in the Federal Government

WASHINGTON, Aug. 7 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund (PRLDEF) and the Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA) today denounced a statement by Antonio San Martin, Jr., an attorney at the federal Office of Personnel Management (OPM), which implements and monitors federal employment practices.

San Martin's quote was published in an Aug. 1 GovExec.com article regarding the National Hispanic Leadership Agenda's Aug. 1, 2006 report, "An Evaluation of OPM's Efforts to Improve Hispanic Representation in the Federal Workforce." This report contains an in-depth and well-documented analysis of OPM's consistent failure to accurately report the state of Hispanic representation in the Federal government as well as OPM's lack of leadership, guidance, coordination, and oversight as required under federal law.

San Martin, who is responsible for coordinating OPM's relationships with Latino advocacy groups, made the following statement regarding the under-representation of Hispanics in federal employment:

"I can't show up to a conference with 50 jobs in my pocket and give them out to the people there as door prizes," San Martin said.

"The OPM statement that falsely compares Latino demands for fair federal employment policies to 'handouts' is outrageous. OPM has failed to make any inroads in effective recruitment, hiring, and retention of Latinos by the federal government," stated John Trasviña, interim president and general counsel of MALDEF. "Eradicating the persistent barriers to federal employment for Latinos is not only the right thing to do, it is required under federal law."

"The NHLA report on Hispanic underrepresentation in the federal government serves as a wake-up call to OPM to begin exercising its legally-mandated obligations," stated Nelson A. Castillo, HNBA national president. "The recent comments of OPM's legal counsel are disturbing and cast serious doubt upon OPM's commitment to a diverse workforce. The HNBA has reached out in the past to the Federal government to create a partnership designed to implement a strategic Hispanic outreach, recruitment and retention plan, to no avail. Instead, various agencies and OPM have cobbled together a patchwork of efforts, if any, many of which are demonstrably ineffective. The foregoing has been done without anything but the most limited lip service to the goal of providing equal access and equal opportunity to the Hispanic community when hiring determinations are made."

"The notion that Hispanics are looking for federal jobs as 'door prizes' as suggested by counsel for OPM underscores a source of Hispanic underrepresentation in the Federal government - an unwillingness to accurately identify the systemic and institutional barriers to Hispanic representation in the Federal government and implement an effective plan to remove them," stated Cesar A. Perales, PRLDEF president and general counsel. "We must hold OPM accountable for its failure to expend any meaningful efforts to identify and remove barriers at OPM itself and provide guidance to other agencies to do the same."

ABOUT HNBA

The HNBA is a non-for-profit, national association representing the interests of over 27,000 Hispanic American attorneys, judges, law professors, law graduates, law students, legal administrators, and legal assistants or paralegals in the United States and Puerto Rico. The mission of the HNBA is to improve the study, practice, and administration of justice for all Americans by ensuring the meaningful participation of Hispanics in the legal profession.

ABOUT MALDEF

Founded in 1968, MALDEF, the nation's premier Latino civil rights organization, promotes and protects the rights of Latinos through advocacy, litigation, community education and outreach, leadership development, and higher education scholarships.

ABOUT PRLDEF

PRLDEF is one of the foremost Latino civil rights organizations in the country, serving a pan-Latino constituency. For over 34 years, PRLDEF's litigation and advocacy has advanced landmark cases that have had profound implications for Latinos throughout the United States, including, challenges to discrimination in employment in private sector and civil service jobs, discrimination in housing, obtaining bilingual education in public schools, using the federal Voting Rights Act to empower Latino voters at the polls and in redistricting, and, in protecting the constitutional and civil rights of migrants and immigrants.