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Kelly v. City of New Haven9/27/2005
ore groups. In contrast, the defendants seek to frame the issue as presenting two separate questions, claiming that: (1) the rounding of civil service examination scores is acceptable since the charter does not explicitly forbid the practice; and (2) the practice of score grouping is permissible under the charter. We decline to adopt the defendants' approach for two reasons. First, this approach would require us to speculate as to whether the charter allows the defendants, under any circumstances, to engage in one or the other of the two practices that comprise the methodology at issue here. We generally eschew, however, making legal pronouncements on matters not directly presented. Second, this approach does not comport with reality: the defendants do not only round the examination scores, nor do they only apply the rule of three to score groups. In other words, as Aristotle observed, the whole is more than the sum of its parts. Aristotle, Metaphysica, para. 1045. That observation is certainly apt here, and thus it is to the whole that we apply our analysis.
A.
We first outline the relevant evidence: (1) comparing how the defendants previously applied and currently apply the rule of three; and (2) explaining the rationale for using the current methodology. As noted previously, prior to 1990, police civil service examination scores were calculated out to at least two decimal points on a scale of 1 to 100. Both the charter and the civil service rules provided that promotion must be made from "those applicants, not exceeding three, who shall stand highest" on the eligibility list. Around 1972, to address the problem of tie scores, the civil service board adopted the practice of treating candidates receiving tie scores as one "rank" or score group. Tie scores under the raw scoring method, however, were relatively rare.
In 1991, the city began the process of revising its charter, with the resulting revisions effective July 1, 1993. The 1993 revision changed the language of the rule of three to provide that promotions from the eligibility lists must be from among "those applicants with the three highest scores . . . ." New Haven Charter, art. XXX, ยง 160. By December, 1993, the city changed its scoring methodology, as applied to police department eligibility lists, and began rounding the scores to whole numbers. The frequency of tie scores and the number of candidates sharing the same score dramatically increased as a result of the change in methodology. For example, the 2000 eligibility list of 149 candidates eligible for promotion to sergeant reflects raw scores resulting in 139 individual scores and five pairs of candidates with tie scores, but rounded scores resulting in one individual score and twenty groups of tie scores ranging in size from two to twenty-two candidates.
Thus, depending on how the defendants exercised their discretion, the pool for promotional consideration could have been as large as forty-five candidates under the present methodology.
The defendants' change in application of the rule of three to the raw scores as compared to rounded scores is illustrated in the following simplified hypothetical:
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