The Aurora Civil Service Commission – which oversees the hiring of entry-level police officers and firefighters – voted to change some of its rules this month after the police department voiced concerns that the hiring process took too long and too easily disqualified candidates.

Former interim police chief Dan Oates had been critical of the commission for practices he saw as letting potential hires go despite the department facing a staffing shortages.

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Commission Chairman Harold Johnson told City Council on Monday that the recent rule changes addressed the police department’s concerns. The number of questions candidates must answer when completing an application has been slashed in half to make it easier, Johnson said. The commission also agreed to stop making some disqualifications automatic, to achieve more of a whole person hiring philosophy, he said.

Those changes already cleared the way for 110 police candidates and 56 firefighter candidates who had been disqualified to continue applying if they choose to, according to a memo Johnson sent to the Aurora City Council.

While the commission has taken a second look at some hiring practices, Johnson is still pushing back against a councilmember’s proposed resolution, saying it would direct the commission to do work it is already doing.

The resolution by Councilmember Dustin Zvonek would direct the city manager and the civil service commission to develop a new process that gives the city’s human resources, police and fire departments more involvement hiring for their entry-level openings. The resolution would also require that the police and fire chiefs get final say in who is hired and sent to academy.

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Zvonek’s resolution, which has not yet come before council for a vote, would stipulate that council receive a report every 60 days about the commission and city staff’s progress in drafting new protocols.

The changes are required as part of the city’s consent decree and must be made before a May 2023 deadline, or else a district court judge could intervene, Zvonek said.

The City of Aurora and the Colorado Attorney General agreed to the terms of the consent decree last year to resolve issues identified in a September 2021 ‘Patterns and Practices’ report about the Aurora Police Department and Aurora Fire Rescue.

The commission has not yet agreed to change rules so that department chiefs have final say in who is hired, Johnson told Zvonek. With the deadline months away, Johnson does not believe the city is anywhere close to triggering court action and that they are already moving toward making rules changes required by the consent decree.

“Everyone is really working together now,” Johnson said.

The lead consent decree independent monitor Jeff Schlanger spoke on Monday to review recent recommendations from the monitoring team that he said would abide by the consent decree and keep the civil service commission involved in hiring.

Two members of the commission would participate in reviewing candidates, oral interviews and the ultimate selection of who is offered positions, if the monitor’s recommendations were adopted, he said. That would occur alongside three representatives from the police and fire departments. The commission would still oversee appeals from rejected applicants, he said.

The recommendations came out of a recent report from the independent monitor that analyzed the department’s hiring practices and potential changes.

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Councilmember Juan Marcano asked the monitor if he thought the resolution was needed in light of the commission and monitor’s research into new processes. He also expressed opposition to the use of polygraph tests during police officer hiring.

“It seems to me that the resolution is full of things that you are already doing,” he said.

Schlanger was unsure that it would help or hurt the process, he said, although he also could not guarantee how negotiations between city staff and the commission would pan out and whether the city would change rules by the May deadline.

Mayor Mike Coffman called Zvonek’s proposal straight forward, while Zvonek said the resolution is intended to keep the city on track.

“What I don’t want to see is something handed to us by a district court, which can happen if we get to that May 15 deadline,” he said.