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Kelly v. City of New Haven9/27/2005
iduals for promotion by changing the rule of three to a rule of five. Despite these various proposals, the only change to the charter's rule regarding selection of candidates that was recommended by the charter revision commission and ultimately adopted by the board of aldermen was to require selection from among the applicants with the three highest scores, rather than from "those applicants, not exceeding three, who shall stand highest" on the eligibility list, as originally set forth in the 1909 charter. The minutes of the meetings do not reflect the charter revision commission's intent in suggesting the change to the charter language. Moreover, despite the 1993 change to the charter, the civil service rule, promulgated in 1962, continues to require that promotion be made from "those applicants, not exceeding three, who shall stand highest on the list of those that shall have passed an examination." New Haven Civil Service Rules and Regs., rule III, § 9.
In light of this history, we can draw certain conclusions. Although it is clear that some change must have been intended in 1993 by amending the rule of three to the present language, the facts surrounding that change do not suggest that the charter revision commission intended to expand significantly the city's discretion by virtue of that change. First, the charter revision commission did not adopt as its final recommendation to the board of aldermen any of the specific proposals offered with respect to abandoning the rule of three limitation or expanding to a rule of five. Second, the charter revision commission crafted its language in light of then existing practices, whereby raw scores were used and tie scores were relatively rare. Thus, we cannot assume that the civil service commission intended to endorse the application of the rule of three to large score groups of applicants created by rounding examination scores. Indeed, the most reasonable inference from this history is that the change to the rule of three was meant to codify the practice instituted by the civil service board in 1972 to resolve the rare tie scores under the previous methodology utilizing raw scores.
That conclusion is underscored by the fact that a significant, substantive change in the charter's rule of three should have prompted action to amend the civil service rule to conform to the charter. Indeed, § 164 of article XXX of the charter as revised in 1993 confirms the rules of the civil service board in operation at the effective date of the charter and requires that the board restudy its rules to make necessary changes in accordance with the revised charter provisions. The fact that the civil service board did not amend its rule suggests that it found the civil service rule of three language basically compatible with the 1993 charter revision, thus further suggesting that the charter revision was not meant to implement far broader discretion than that exercised under the old rules.
We also are mindful of the policy that the charter was designed to implement, which similarly militates against a conclusion that the 1993 revision retaining the rule of three significantly expanded the defendants' discretion as applied under their methodology. The civil service board was designed "to eliminate as far as practicable the element of partisanship and personal favoritism in making appointments." (Emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted.) Resnick v. Civil Service Commission, 156 Conn. 28, 33, 238 A.2d 391 (1968). Promotion on the basis of merit, not nepotism, has been the guiding rule. McAdams v. Barbieri, 143 Conn. 405, 421, 123 A.2d 182 (1956). Thus, the defendants' discretion in making such promotional decisions must be limited. Cassella v. Civil Servi
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