C chief be e
oes and 91-0
•
speaking terms with h� Not ly the House
one of� predecessors counsels Committee, the Iect Commit­
wiJh him. Indeed, several have tee On Aging 0 the House of
testified against . on the Hill.' Representatives he was mortal­
ly wounded wbe he was called
"a liar" during a earing before
the Aging co ittee) and the
Government A unting Office
have taken t· Thomas'
own study ilia ints out some
C A. ,Sr.
NNPA News Editor
, WASHINGTON, D.C. - By
. own dmissioo when he ar­
rived on the federal scene seven
years ago, he a eophyte and
unprepared for the wlune ·of
.animosity out there", said
Clarence chairman of
the Equal Employment Oppo -
tunity CollllDiuion for the past
six years, the longest occupant of
the eight chairman of that or­
ganization.
"They have called me an
'Unc e Tom', 'a foot shufftin'
(man) with a water-melon catin'
grin'." 0 civil rights leader, save
freshman Georgia Con­
gressman John Lewis is on
EACH YEAR his budget re­
quests wbile approved by Presi­
den,t Reagan with minor chan­
ges. are slashed by those villains
"00 the Hill". "They", presumab-
• ,I
13
,
,
things that are wrong and need
correcting and are pounding
him over the head with it. Indeed
if it were not for his wife, Vir­
ginia Lamp Thomas, whom b
recently married, the embattled
EEOC chairman just might u(
and' quit his job. Ho ver,· the
next breath, he grimly pro .
that if he is chased out of town, .
"I'll go out with my head held
high".
When lie arrived at the Com­
. ion in May 1982 from a posi-
. lion with the Dept. of Educa­
tion, there were DO computers.
He has no installed 1,100 for
his 3,200 employees, which in­
dude 300 lawyers, 1,200 inves­
tigators, and an assortme of
computer specialiasts, program­
mers and administrative staff
support in 50 subunits - 23
regional, district and local of­
fice . But even this excellent·
move has turned to dross.
Thomas admits made some •
mistakes in trying to P in too
mu&, too quickly and 60 we are
DOW going b ck to correct this".
HE IS BEING san<U>agged by
"the age thing" - they are kill­
ing us". The multi-millio -mem­
ber, highly aggressive American
�ciation of Retired Persons
(AARP) is forcing Thomas'
agency to put "age cases", be­
cause of the statute of limita­
tion , ahead of race cases".
Race cases, still about 50 per­
cent of tbe agency caseload,
hav no time limitations. Ago
cases represent about 20 per
cent of the Commission' case
load and growing. .
o THE FL. I E, there
are some good things. When he
was appointed chairman of
EEOC, Thomas announced a
plan to improve the agency and
drew buge guffa from the in­
dustry it regulates.
"We said w would and could
do certain things," he . d. 'We
would investigate and litigate
, more cases; th t would have
a good sy temic program;
would put together compliance
manuals. We were going to
upgrade our remedies policy
and that we were going to hay
stronger enforcement presence.
They thought that was rhetoric.
Well, it wasn't rhetoric. That
a statement of a plan. What
are doing here no ," dded
trlnmphantly,"] delivering on
that plan."
Last year, for the first time in
the 23-year history of the agency
a program, funded for more
than a million dollars, was put in
place to professionally train "all
of our people in how to in\lCS­
tigate cases," Thoma said
proudly." WhttD I came ... here
C d 14
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