SPRINGDALE — The City Council, with a new fire chief ready to begin, started discussions on changing how a fire or police chief will be hired or fired.
The council ordinance committee, meeting Monday, tabled a proposal to allow the mayor to terminate police and fire chiefs. Instead, the committee discussed letting the mayor hire and dismiss chiefs.
“It’s hard for me to understand having a supervisor who can’t fire the people under him,” said Brad Bruns, alderman.
The Springdale Civil Service Commission has the hiring and firing power over the police and fire chiefs. The commission hired Michael Irwin as fire chief in July. Irwin’s first day on the job will be Monday, after leaving his previous position as fire chief of Pocatello, Idaho.
For the hiring and firing power to go to the mayor, the council would have to repeal the ordinance that approved giving that power to the commission, said Jeff Harper, city attorney.
“State law gives that power to the mayor, unless a city approves an ordinance to give it to the commission,” Harper said. “That is what the council did.”
The ordinance was passed so a mayor couldn’t terminate the police and fire chiefs when coming into office, said Alderman Jim Reed.
“The council wanted to take the politics out of it,” Reed said. Reed was not on the council when the ordinance was passed.
Springdale is the only city in the state, Harper said, that gives the hiring and firing power to a civil service commission.
The original proposal would allow the mayor to remove a police or fire chief, with an automatic appeal to the commission.
“All the mayor can do now is send them on a vacation,” Reed said.
The mayor can suspend a chief for 30 days without pay, Harper said. Springdale Mayor Doug Sprouse suspended Duane Atha, the former fire chief, with pay in October 2011. Atha was suspended until he announced his retirement in December.
Several council members argued either the mayor or the commission, but not both, should be able to fire the chiefs.
“We need to have it one way or the other,” said Alderman Mike Overton.
The committee will discuss the hiring process at its next meeting, Sept. 17.