City Council backs change to way Worcester fills top Police Department posts

WORCESTER — With City Manager Eric D. Batista calling the move "extremely important," City Council Tuesday unanimously authorized him to request the state Legislature exempt the roles of Worcester police chief and four deputy police chief positions from civil service.

"This is extremely important for the leadership, it's a step forward in the right direction," Batista said.

Batista, in a communication accompanying the request, wrote that the current system only allows promotions through a pipeline of candidates who passed the exam, thus limiting the pool of candidates.

In Massachusetts, the civil service system, dating to the 1800s, governs the filling of certain municipal positions. The goal is equal access without political interference.

While Worcester is not fully moving away from civil service, Batista noted that at least 36 police departments and eight fire departments have moved away from the system, including Boston and Cambridge, that no longer use it for promotions to executive leadership.

Following former Police Chief Steven M. Sargent's retirement in September, Interim Chief Paul Saucier has overseen the department and the city was evaluating options for the process of hiring a permanent police chief. Civil service would preclude the city from doing a national search for the chief position.

The city has fought legal battles over civil service, agreeing to a settlement in 2021 with two Black officers whose allegations preceded a scathing 2015 decision from the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination.

In September, Councilor-at-Large Khrystian King submitted an order requesting that Batista provide language that would remove the civil service requirement for the position in order to "consider the expansion of the applicant pool" for police chief. The City Council sent the order to Batista in October.

In 2021, the city's Diversity & Inclusion Advisory Committee made a preliminary recommendation for the city as a whole to opt out of civil service, citing issues with hiring diversity and the length of the process.

A racial equity audit of Worcester police suggested removing the deputy chief positions, as well as the chief position, from civil service.

Batista said the police department and community groups are in support of taking the positions out of civil service.

The audit made a wide range of recommendations for the department including consideration of removing the entire department from civil service.

While other city police departments, such as Framingham's, exited civil service, Batista said exiting civil service would be more difficult for a police department of Worcester's size. He did believe the department would likely support the full removal if current officers were protected.

"We also need to be careful that removing civil service completely from a department that size, that large, is not a small task," Batista said.

Mayor Joseph M. Petty said Batista did a good job researching the practices of other departments across the state and country and said taking the positions out of civil service gave the city more "discretion" in selecting chief and deputy chief.

Petty said he understood civil service is in place to remove the risk of nepotism or politics in appointments, but he believed the city would avoid politically motivated decision making.

King pointed to existing racial disparities in promotions for Worcester police.

"This will also right some inequities that we've had," King said.

Last week, the union representing the city’s police supervisors wrote a letter to city councilors objecting to removing the department from civil service.

The union, International Brotherhood of Police Officers Local 504, noted that some of its members are on promotion lists to become deputy chief — lists it said are supposed to remain valid for two years.

"Civil service as a government agency provides fairness in the public sector, in entry-level hiring; promotions, demotions, layoffs, and discipline/terminations,” the union’s Executive Board wrote in the March 14 letter.

The union also wrote that an unfair labor practice charge could be filed if the city removed deputy chiefs from civil service.

The union that represents Worcester’s rank-and-file officers, New England Police Benevolent Association Local 911, agreed in its most recent contract to form a committee with the city to “review eliminating civil service from the department.”

When asked about the existing promotion list for the deputy chief positions by Petty, Batista said the city would still honor the list.

City Council voted 10-0 in favor of authorizing Batista to make the request to the state Legislature. Councilor-at-Large Kathleen Toomey was absent Tuesday.

Following the vote, Sgt. Richard Cipro, head of the police officials union, said he was happy to see that the full department was staying in civil service, especially for the members represented by his union.

Cipro said Batista's promise to still honor the promotion list means there is no need to file an unfair labor practice on behalf of his union members.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: City Council backs change to Civil service hiring of top police posts