The agreement covers approximately 3,400 Black employees who took a test on or after Jan. 1, 1997, to enter Ford’s apprenticeship program but were not chosen to participate. Under this plan, employees were trained for higher-paid jobs, such as electricians and millwrights. In their lawsuit, Black workers charged that Ford selected them for the program at a substantially lower rate than it did for other employees.

Under the terms of the settlement, Ford will set aside 279 positions in its training program for Black employees who had taken the test for the apprenticeship but were not admitted. The company will also pay each of those employees $2,400. The 11 former and current employees at Ford plants in Sharonville and Batavia, Ohio, who originally filed the complaint against the company, will be paid $30,000 each. The higher amount is intended to compensate them for their assistance in the case and in exchange for release of their court claims, according to press reports.

Ford is also obligated to pay attorneys who represented the workers and cover all court costs, estimated at $1.1 million. A year after the settlement’s approval, the company will pay the attorneys $567,000 for implementing and monitoring the agreement.

Ford has denied any wrongdoing but ended the program anyway. “Based on some of the issues that had been raised, we stopped the training program in August,” said company spokesman Glenn Ray. The company also agreed to set up a new apprenticeship program “to be monitored by an industrial psychologist with expertise in workplace and personnel issues,” AP reported.

The United Auto Workers, which represents workers at Ford and participated in the apprenticeship committee, was also a defendant in the suit.  
 
 
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