EPD, EFD mull adjustments to residency rule
For the past several years, the El Dorado police and fire departments have been looking at ways to increase their talent pools to find qualified candidates.
Changing up marketing strategies by targeting younger recruits via social media and visiting area colleges has helped to cast a wider net for applicants and increase rates for candidates who pass annual civil service exams, police and fire officials have said.
Law enforcement agencies and fire departments across the country are experiencing similar issues due to a waning interest in such public safety jobs, Fire Chief Chad Mosby has reported.
The chiefs of the El Dorado police and fire departments have also said retention has become an issue over the years, with uniformed personnel increasingly leaving for higher paying jobs in the private sector.
To help with recruitment and retention, the El Dorado City Council agreed in 2015 to a new pay structure that upped starting pay for both departments and amended pay-scales per rank.
Fire Chief Chad Mosby and former police Chief Billy White fought vigorously for the new pay structure during city budget talks that year, telling city officials that the changes would bring the city’s pay structure up to par with that of other fire and police departments in cities that are comparable in size to El Dorado.
For example, starting pay for new hires at the police department went from $13.33 an hour to $14.73. Within the fire department, entry-level salaries rose from $29,000 a year to $33,000.
While such efforts have helped to increase the number of candidates who are signing up to join the police and fire departments, members of the El Dorado Civil Service Commission, Mosby and police Chief Kenny Hickman all agreed that more needs to be done to sustain those numbers and increase them even more.
During an ECSC meeting Sept. 23, commissioners and Hickman solidified plans for a second round of civil service exams this year.
The tests are administered each spring and both departments are usually able to immediately hire candidates to fill available positions.
To fill vacancies that come open before the
next testing cycle, both departments have mostly been able to pull from an eligibility list of candidates who pass exams but are not immediately hired because of a lack of vacancies at the time the exams are administered.
The lists are good for up to one year after civil service exams are certified.
In recent years, however, the civil service commission has occasionally held additional testing cycles within a year to keep pace with positions that open up because of resignations, retirements and a handful of terminations.
Such is the case this year, with Hickman telling commissioners that the El Dorado Police Department has had up to 11 vacancies since civil service exams were administered in June.
Hickman said he hired four entry-level officers who passed exams in June and within the past couple of weeks, he has hired three certified officers.
With one officer back from a military deployment and another expected to return from a deployment within the next two weeks, Hickman said the EPD now has two open positions.
He said the eligibility list from the spring exams has been exhausted and an additional testing cycle for new hires is needed this year.
The exams are set for 6 p.m. Oct. 19 in the activity building at the Union County Fairgrounds.
Mosby said the EFD is fully staffed and still has some candidates on its eligibility list for 2020.
Now the chiefs of both departments and civil service commissioners are considering another option to attract qualified candidates to El Dorado.
Residency requirements
On Sept. 23, Toddy Pitard, chairman of the civil service commission, broached a topic that has previously been discussed: changing the residency requirement for hiring uniformed personnel within the police and fire departments.
“We’ve sort of been kicking this can down the road. Right now, it’s within Union County or (up to) 30 miles (from El Dorado)? So, we’re wanting to move it where?” Pitard asked.
In 2012, the ECSC voted to extend the residency requirement from a 25- to 30-mile radius, excluding North Louisiana.
At the time, former commission chairman Scott Ellen said he was surprised to learn that residents from Huttig or Felsenthal could not work for the El Dorado police and fire departments because of the then-25-mile distance requirement.
Mosby said Sept. 23 that the issue has been an ongoing debate within the fire service industry nationwide.
“The trend is that many states are doing away with residency requirements to increase their pool of applicants,” he said.
Smaller fire departments rely on the requirement for callbacks in response to emergency events and while the El Dorado Fire Department also depends on call-backs, Mosby said such instances are few and far between.
“It’s a rare instance that we call in that many people. We’re interested in having quality people on the street,” he said.
There have been discussions about extending the radius to reach deeper into South Arkansas, including Camden, Magnolia, Crossett and Warren, the fire chief said.
“There’s a lot of low hanging fruit the farther away you go,” Mosby told commissioners.
He mentioned North Louisiana and said that many smaller departments in the region do not pay as much as the EFD, adding that the department recently hired a certified firefighter from Grambling, Louisiana.
“He was tickled to make the starting salary. He had been with them for five years and he wasn’t even making the starting salary here,” Mosby said. “That could be another candidate pool and we could do some target marketing.”
Hickman said the distance allowances for the EFD differ from the police department because local firefighters work 24-hour shifts while police officers are on for 12 hours.
“If we have someone that’s outside that 30-mile range, they wouldn’t be eligible for the SWAT team or detectives because that residency requirement is for quick response,” Hickman explained.
“Their function within the departments and their assignments would be limited,” he added.
However, Hickman said that extending the radius could help with retention, telling commissioners that one EPD officer “who does a good job” would like to live in Columbia County.
He also said the EPD “pretty attractive” to the talent pool in South Arkansas because of what the department has to offer for entry-level candidates and certified officers.
Commissioner Janis Van Hook inquired about an out-ofstate employee within the fire department and Mosby said the Junction City, Louisiana, resident was granted a waiver for a city policy that requires city employees to hold an Arkansas driver’s license.
“In Junction City, he lives on family land. He inherited a house where his kids and his wife live,” Mosby said. “That’s in the city (employee) handbook and one of the things that’s on the city council’s agenda is redoing that handbook. It needs to be updated.”
Mosby said he has reached out to other cities and of the cities he’s spoken to, El Dorado is the only one that has such a policy.
“I don’t want to take down a fence without knowing why it was put up. Do we know why it was put in there in the first place?” Pitard asked.
Mosby explained that the policy was added decades ago as a template that was issued by the Arkansas Municipal League from which cities could draft personnel policies.
“That language is still in there and it has not been tailored to fit the needs of certain cities. It’s good for cities like those in Central Arkansas but not for border towns,” he said.
Mosby noted that Bastrop, Louisiana, residents work for the Crossett Fire Department. The two cities are about 45 minutes apart.
Van Hook also expressed concern about potential insurance/ liability issues with extending the residency requirement.
Pitard asked Hickman and Mosby to draft proposals to revise the residency requirement, consider placing a percentage cap on the number of employees who would be allowed to live outside a 30-mile radius and to make sure the situation does not pose any liability risks.