Firefighter sues city for gender discrimination
By Angela Greiner Community Reporter

Marlborough - City councilors stand behind their decision not to increase the pay step of fiveyear firefighter Tricia Richard after she filed charges of unlawful discrimination based on her gender. Richard, who had worked as a firefighter for the town of Reading for four years at a base pay of $46,582, was hired by Marlborough Sept. 3, 2007, at the lowest step rate of $41,165, which is the same pay rate as a newly hired first-year firefighter.

She agreed to accept the position in spite of the low pay, she said, because she believed, based on conversations with Fire Chief David Adams, that her pay rate would jump to match her years of experience after approval from the City Council.

"All of the police that come over from other cities start off with the years of experience that they left off at …," Richard said. "It is like a rubber stamp - they all get bumped up."

Richard has five years as a firefighter and is a level-two paramedic: according to the steps for a firefighter in Marlborough, the base pay for a firefighter at that level would be $50,996.

City Council President Arthur Vigeant explained that the step increase is a decision made case-by-case by the City Council, not the fire chief.

Adams refused to comment on the issue.

Richard, who is currently working next to firefighters with fewer years of experience, but are paid more than she is, said she was shocked when the city denied her pay increase. What prompted Richard to pursue legal action, she said, was the discovery that more a dozen male police officers, some of whose cases were reviewed after hers, were automatically approved by the council without discussion.

She said that she was in such disbelief that this happened that she thought that maybe the City Council denied the pay increase because maybe they did not understand her qualifications.

"I never saw this coming. I have never had an issue being a female in the Fire Department," Richard said.

Boston-based attorney Tamsin Kaplan, representing Richard, said that all Richard is looking for is to be treated the same as others in the Police and Fire departments.

Vigeant denied the notion that Richard was deprived the increase because there was a diff erent protocol for the Fire Department and the Police Department.

"One has nothing to do with the other. Each is done on its own merit," Vigeant said. "It has nothing to do with gender, Fire Department versus Police Department."

"The City Council only gets involved with lateral hires and it is their discretion to bump up the pay," Kaplan said. "Every other lateral hire has been a man and each one has been bumped up … It has been automatic with very little discussion."

Vigeant explained that there was some confusion with Richard's initial appeal being submitted late. When the request first came in, he said, it went to the Finance Committee and was then never reported out to City Council.

"I thought the issue was done and gone," he said.

The request, according to a statement attached to the charges submitted against the city, outlined the chain of events, which began Oct. 1, 2007, with a letter from Adams to Mayor Nancy Stevens asking for a step-three rate increase. In a letter sent to the City Council from the mayor Oct. 10, Stevens requested that Richard receive the level three step increase, commensurate with her years of experience. On Oct. 22, 2007, the Finance Committee voted to approve a leveltwo rate increase. On Dec. 17, 2007, the City Council denied the recommendation of City Council. On April 22, William Taylor, president of the Firefighters Union, requested that Stevens ask for the salary increase a second time, and, once again, on July 14, the City Council denied the pay increase.

Despite repeated phone calls to the city's Legal Department, no one from the Legal Department responded for this article.

Richard said that she loves working for the city and did not want to have her name and information in the newspapers, but with no response from the city, she felt she had no other option.