Portland, Maine: White cabbie files discrimination lawsuit against city, all airport licenses went to Somalis and Iranians
More refugee-related problems coming to light in Maine (see yesterday Lewiston Somali arsonist). If the facts are true, it sure looks like an open and shut case of discrimination.
Somali cab drivers protesting in Portland in 2011. New city rule said they must apply in person for licenses (not with power-of-attorney while in Somalia!). There is clearly a heck of a lot going on with this licensing program and don’t you wonder why Somalis are so organized at airports around the country?http://bangordailynews.com/2011/12/05/news/portland/somali-taxi-drivers-say-new-portland-policy-aims-to-shut-them-down/
From the Portland Press Herald (emphasis mine):
A white taxicab driver has filed a lawsuit accusing the city of Portland of racial discrimination for denying him one of 45 permits to work as part of the Portland International Jetport’s taxi pool.
The driver, Paul McDonough of South Portland, said in the lawsuit filed Tuesday in Cumberland County Superior Court in Portland that the city’s current jetport taxicab permit system is “blatantly discriminatory” because it has issued permits only to people of Somali or Iranian descent or nationality.
“How does it happen that 45 licenses all go to one racial group who just arrived in this country?” McDonough’s attorney, David Turesky, said in an interview after filing the lawsuit.
Turesky said that in 2008, the city granted all of its then 50 jetport licenses to Somali or Iranian immigrants without opening bidding to the general public. The city reduced the number of available jetport licenses in July 2013 to 45, “grandfathering” in those license holders, again without opening the bidding process to the public.
“It was done in a way that was never publicized,” Turesky said. “Our supposition is something was done to benefit these gentlemen or this particular group. But we don’t know how. We don’t know precisely what the motive was. We don’t know who paid for the licenses.”
The city’s attorney, Corporation Counsel Danielle West-Chuhta, did not respond to a phone message seeking comment on the lawsuit. ...
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