Subodh Chandra
When I started as Cleveland Law Director and Prosecuting Attorney in 2002, I was appalled to discover that there were 0% minority prosecutors in our criminal division, for a City that is majority-minority. By the time I left in 2005, the figure was about 55%. I hired talented African-Americans and Latinos, including the son and grandson of migrant farmworkers, who went on to serve as a court magistrate after working with me. (I also gave a start to the prosecutor, Victor Perez, whom Bob Triozzi eventually hired as chief assistant prosecutor, and worked hard to recruit Teresa Metcalf Beasley, who went on to serve as law director, and is now with a major law firm.)
There is a lot of talk about diversity, and much of it is cheap. What matters is our records. I am attaching my record. The first item is a set of charts that will show you the numbers. The second (attached to the next entry due to attachment limitations) is an article I wrote about reforming the law department, which includes a section on our diversity philosophy and achievements. You'll see from the charts, for example, that in my first full year as law director, 2003, 62% of my new hires were African-American. The majority of my new hires were also female. You'll also see that I increased the percentages of both supervisors and line-lawyers of color. These lawyers were recruited to public service not only from out of law school, but also from prestigious law firms and federal judicial clerkships. They were the best and the brightest.
The diversity led to substantial synergy in our decisionmaking. It was a beautiful thing to watch unfold sometimes. (Picture six lawyers, all from different backgrounds, in a room trying to decide the best way to resolve, on the City's behalf, serious discrimination allegations.)
How did I make this happen? Not passively, by just waiting to see résumés that floated in. I actively identified promising lawyers from all diverse backgrounds and personally recruited them, by mail, by phone, and in-person meetings. (I had someone assigned full-time my first summer to help me do just that.) I sat with each person I wanted to bring in and talked with them about their hopes, aspirations, and dreams:
- What kind of lawyers did they want to be?
- What kind of career did they want to have?
- Why did they get into law in the first place?
- Wouldn't they rather have hands-on trial and transactional experience rather than just be doing research and third chairing matters at best?
As the first small group of talented minority lawyers came in and tested the waters, the ball really began rolling as the department's reputation among minorities improved. Unfortunately, many of the wonderful lawyers I recruited have left in recent years due to low morale; I know because I had to provide them with references. They told me they just didn't feel the same enthusiasm because their leadership never fought for them, nurtured them, or even engaged them; they had not even received performance evaluations in years. This has been a huge personal disappointment to me.
As you probably know from personal experience, and I know from personal experience as well as my experience as co-chair for several years of the Cleveland Bar Association's Diversity Action Committee, one of the biggest challenges in diversity for law firms is not recruitment, but retention. Anyone can promise the sun and moon. But can you deliver a professionally satisfying experience and liberate people to live up to their full potential? That's what makes the difference.
I hope you'll review the charts attached. We created the most diverse public law firm in Ohio and I was proud to work there. That's what I'll do for the Prosecutor's Office and this community will benefit greatly as a result, both in terms of the quality of decisions that will be made, and the future leadership that will be nurtured.
Here is a way you may measure my success. If, eight to twelve years from now, there are not at least two (preferably more) highly talented minority lawyers whom I mentored credibly running countywide to replace me, then I have failed.
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Download attached file
Posted Jan 26, 2012
Welcome to this candidates' forum. Here's our first question.
Everybody promises to be tough on crime. Describe your philosophy of the job, and specifically, what separates you from your opponents. Put another way, what do you plan to do that wouldn't likely occur to the other folks in the race?
TogglePosted Jan 23, 2012