Commission finds ‘racial animus’

Charges of racial discrimination by parents of 56 African-American and Latino/a children against an all-white swim club in a Philadelphia suburb were backed up in a report by the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission.

On June 29 several children from Creative Steps day camp reported hearing racist comments after they arrived at the club for a scheduled swim. When the prepaid contract that allowed the northeast Philadelphia day camp to use the pool was revoked after the children’s first visit, the camp director made the story public, eliciting a national outcry.

The state’s investigation found that “racial animus ... and the racially coded comments” by club members at the Valley Club in Huntingdon Valley, Montgomery County, were the reasons the club revoked Creative Steps’ contract. The 33-page report was released Sept. 22 by an attorney representing four of the campers.

After initially allowing the children to swim, the club refunded their money with the following explanation: “Having so many unskilled swimmers at one time represented a safety hazard.” The HRC report says that was a lie, noting that large groups had used the club before.

The report examined Valley Club leaders’ actions, including members’ e-mails, both before and after Creative Steps’ trip to the pool. According to the report, after the campers left, one club member threatened to rethink his membership and e-mails circulated about the issue.

In one e-mail board member George Whitehill wrote, “Race is an issue since every e-mail of complaint mentioned race, although stating that race had nothing to do with the complaint. It only takes one out of the 120 parents to make this an issue, and at no cost to them.”

Whitehill and Bill Dymowski, another board member, argued against canceling Creative Steps’ contract and resigned from the board when club director John Duesler announced he was “pulling the plug on the camp.”

One club member, Walt Slowinski, wrote to other members under the racially charged subject line of “bussing” that “when we joined we assumed that this was a private club not a club for hire or some sort of social program.”

The report also cited the actions of club member Michelle Flynn, an elementary school teacher, who was heard by one of the campers as saying: “What are all these Black kids doing here?” Commission investigators noted that Flynn and another teacher, Deborah Mindel, who work at the school where Creative Steps is housed, allegedly told other club members that one of the boys was “a known thief” who had stolen a teacher’s cell phone. The state’s report noted that none of the campers had ever been “charged, disciplined, suspended, or expelled” for theft at school.

Flynn and Mindel were among several white parents who removed their children from the pool after the Creative Steps campers entered. Flynn wrote in an e-mail sent to another member: “This is not the community where these kids live. ... I don’t feel comfortable with my children even going to the bathroom during this time.”

After the report was made public, parents demonstrated outside the Carnell Elementary School to demand that the Philadelphia School District fire Flynn and Mindel for their roles in the Valley Club incident. Christine Pembleton, mother of the youth Flynn accused of stealing, expressed her outrage over how her son was treated by his former teacher. “My son is not a thief,” Pembleton said, “and I am going to go after them. ... She doesn’t deserve to teach.” (Philadelphia Inquirer, Sept. 23)

The Human Relations Commission study said that none of the club’s paid members in 2008 or 2009 was African American. It also noted that Valley Club efforts to expand its membership by recruiting through direct mail were “mainly directed at areas with overwhelmingly Caucasian populations.” It made no efforts to market to adjacent areas with significant African-American populations.

The Commission ordered Valley Club to pay a $50,000 civil penalty for their discrimination against one child whose parents filed the complaint with the commission. The club was also ordered to pay other damages, including legal expenses.

Other parents may file cases, so damages against Valley Club could total millions of dollars. The Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice is also investigating the complaints.