Denver voters will decide if qualified non-citizens can apply for police and fire jobs

Denver voters will decide in November if the city will remove its citizenship requirement for police and fire department jobs. 

The change would allow non-citizens who meet certain work and residency requirements to apply for roles in those departments, bringing Denver into compliance with federal anti-discrimination laws. 

City Council voted unanimously on Monday to pass the question on to voters this fall. 

If passed, applicants would still need to meet a number of physical, mental, age and education requirements that apply to all police and fire recruits. Applications without U.S. citizenship would apply to people with valid work authorization, people with legal permanent residency and those with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status who arrived in the country as children.

In 2016, the city settled a lawsuit with the U.S. Justice Department over citizenship requirements for the Sheriff Department, which violated the federal Immigration and Nationality Act. 

This new bill aims to bring Denver’s Police and Fire Departments in line. 

A 2023 state bill lifted a ban on certain non-citizens carrying firearms, a requirement for some of those jobs.

Councilmember Jamie Torres is cosponsoring the bill with Council President Amanda Sandoval.

“We absolutely are standing right in the face of employment discrimination, and I don’t want to see that in our charter, in any of our code, and for us to just look like we can ignore it until the Department of Justice comes knocking at our door,” Torres said. “I think it’s responsible for us to make sure that we lift that barrier and that issue proactively. And that I think is one thing, but the other is it’s the right thing to do.”

Qualified applicants without citizenship can already serve in the Denver Sheriff Department and several other city roles. 

Many other cities including Aurora already allow non-citizens to serve in police and fire departments. Denver’s Civil Service Commission, a few nonprofits that work with immigrants and leadership from both Fire and Police departments wrote letters in support of the change. 

Torres emphasized that the proposal is not in response to the influx of new immigrants in Denver. That group of newcomers would not be eligible for these jobs until they received legal permanent residency or work authorization. 

But the potential change does come as Denver struggles with staffing in civil service roles like the Police Department. 

“I saw a lot of the misinformation headlines out there tying this to quote-unquote ‘illegal immigrants,’ which I hate, but it isn’t for undocumented residents,” she said. “I think people needed to be reminded that we still have rules and laws and vetting in place for any job, not just our safety jobs.”

Denver voters will decide on Nov. 5.