By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice
This November, Denver voters will decide whether to change the city charter with a ballot question that never mentions the word “citizenship.”
The question they’ll see asks whether the charter should be “amended to modernize the Civil Service Commission and Department of Safety by removing outdated language, giving City Council the ability to add duties via code, and providing for an extension of probation when required for medical, military, or other approved leave.”
Nothing in that sentence tells a voter that one of the things being removed is the requirement that the people who oversee the hiring of every Denver police officer and firefighter be United States citizens. But that is what the measure does.
What the redline shows
The change lives in Section 9.3.2 of the charter. The city’s own line-by-line redline of the amendment strikes an entire sentence: “The Commissioners shall be citizens of the United States.”
The Civil Service Commission is a five-member board. Two members are appointed by the mayor, two by City Council, and a fifth is normally nominated by the mayor and appointed by Council. Councilwoman Amanda Sandoval described what the board does at the Aug. 3 Council meeting.
“What does the Civil Service Commission do? It hires all of our police and fire department,” Sandoval said.
The board runs the merit selection and promotion system for the Denver police and fire departments.
It controls entry and promotional examinations and administers the disciplinary-review process, contracting with hearing officers who hear disciplinary and disqualification appeals. Under this amendment, a non-citizen would be eligible to sit on it.
In the materials accompanying the measure, the city is explicit about the change. Its summary says the amendment removes the citizenship requirement and describes that requirement as outdated. The ballot question itself does not say so.
How it reached the ballot
Sandoval and Councilwoman Jamie Torres began the effort in May of last year. They ran it through more than a year of review with the Civil Service Commission, the Department of Safety, the Office of the Independent Monitor, the city attorneys, and the police and fire unions.
The two council members carried a companion ordinance, File 26-1055, alongside the charter measure, File 26-1048.
At second reading on Aug. 10, both bills passed in a 12-0 block vote. Neither was called out for separate floor discussion.
The comments came a week earlier, at first reading. That is where Torres described what the amendment does.
“We brought this particular section up to speed on gender-neutral language, on allowing non-citizens to serve on the Civil Service Commission,” Torres said. “We had already fixed classified service recruitment for police and fire when it comes to that.”
That last line points to a change voters already made.
Denver voters approved Referred Question 2T in November 2024, removing the U.S. citizenship requirement for police officer and firefighter applicants.
The measure passed narrowly, 168,037 to 163,458, according to the Denver Elections Division.
Applicants still must clear every other hiring standard and hold valid work authorization. The 2026 measure extends the same reasoning up to the board that governs those hires.
“Grounded in equity”
Sandoval thanked a staffer from the city’s Office of Social Equity and Innovation for the approach the two council members took.
“I want to give a special thank you to Robin from the office of OSEI to help us who grounded our work in equity with an equity lens,” Sandoval said.
The presentation Sandoval and Torres used to walk Council through the package carried the banner “Leading with Equity.” The Civil Service Commission itself, in a June letter urging Council to refer the measure, put the citizenship change in the same terms. Removing the requirement, the commission wrote, “promotes inclusivity by expanding access to qualified candidates and ensuring that the Charter reflects and respects the diversity of our community.”
The commission’s letter was signed by Executive Director Gracie Perez and four of its commissioners. Police Chief Ron Thomas and Fire Chief Desmond Fulton each sent letters of support.
The amendment is broad.
It removes fixed caps on command staff in the police and fire departments, subject to budget. It moves longevity pay out of the charter, where the city says it duplicates the collective bargaining agreements. It extends several disciplinary and suspension timelines. It shifts the selection of hearing officers and other administrative details from the charter into ordinance.
It also strikes a requirement that applicants “be of good moral character,” a phrase the city calls undefined and ambiguous.
The charter separately keeps its background-investigation requirement, and polygraph and suitability screening remain part of the commission’s hiring process.
A date that does not match
One piece of the package does not line up. The charter bill and the ballot title set the election for November 3, 2026.
The companion ordinance, in both its working draft and filed version, says it takes effect after passage at a special municipal election “to be held in conjunction with the coordinated election of November 5, 2026.” November 5 was Election Day in 2024. The 2026 coordinated election falls on November 3.
Whether that is a clerical error carried into the filed bill or something the city will need to correct is a question for the City Attorney’s office.
What voters will weigh
Denver has amended these charter provisions in pieces since 1904. Much of what this measure changes is old administrative language that no longer describes how the departments run.
The citizenship line is different.
It is a live requirement, and the amendment removes it from the board that governs the merit selection, promotion and disciplinary review system for Denver police officers and firefighters. Torres described that change plainly in chambers. The ballot question in front of voters describes it as removing outdated language.