Good evening, everybody.

I am calling the meeting to order.

It is 6 30 p.m.

here on Tuesday, 28th of April 2026.

This is the City Council ad hoc committee for the amendment to ordinances section 22-19 through 22-30, which is the police department eligibility ordinance.

I'm Joe Britton.

I'm the chairman of this ad hoc.

I have full attendance from my committee, Councilman Holly and Councilman Henry.

We'll just go around the room so the mic picks you up.

So we'll start at the table.

If you could just give your name and your title so the camera picks you up.

Mike Sturvant, Deputy Chief of Police.

Patrick Ridenhauer, police chief.

Taylor O'Brien, Chief of Staff.

Tracy Now R Sisting Corporation Council.

Peter Bazet, Council for She's pension AC City Council.

We draw down our city council, ward seven.

And we have Mayor Alves with us as well.

Okay, so the agenda for tonight is to go over the proposed changes to the police ordinance.

This was presented and discussed the last city council meeting as I understand it.

What we are doing is we are changing our local ordinance to make it in line with the uh recommendation and directive from the police officer standards and training council, um, which would allow eligibility to extend um and waive the citizenship requirement and extend eligibility for appointment to a position of probationary candidate in a law enforcement unit to permanent legal residents.

Um that be and DACA recipients as well.

Um so that being said, um we'll go in the committee, we'll ask questions.

Um we'll go to exficia.

You can ask questions as well.

We have um police department here as well, and the mayor's office.

Um they can have their opportunity to present to um before I get to questions.

I'll defer uh to the mayor and tailor if you guys want to start it off, or if we want to field questions first.

Yeah, please feel questions.

Okay, so we'll start with the committee.

Any questions from the committee?

No real questions, I guess just an observation.

It seems like we're adopting the post standards, but also making some revisions to some like semantics in the ordinance to changing letters to from uppercase to lowercase and then uh removing any kind of uh gender language to make sure they're gender inclusive language, like they, them, that type of thing, which I am a big fan of.

Uh no other questions.

But I would like to hear from the police chief on some information about uh what went behind this and why it's a good fit for Danbury.

That's a question, but you want to frame it as a question.

The floor is yours, councilman.

But I'll pass it over to it.

Okay.

That's what I'm saying.

Councilman, if um whoever in the room wants to explain the DACA recipient eligibility or the what actually DACA recipient is.

They're eligible.

I mean, what's the specific question on eligibility to the chair?

So the specifics of being a DOCA recipient.

Well, I don't think anybody here's the migration expert.

What we understand is the federal government uh gives out things like green cards, which is permanent residents or craze people citizens, and then there's another uh status that is a DACA recipient, uh quote unquote.

You may have heard it's dreamers.

Uh it is a federal government designation.

Um they would have identification or some kind of documentation showing that there are DACA recipients, just like a green card holder would just like we do when we show our our IDs.

In fact, better than local ID because it'd be something federal.

Follow-up is so explaining looking at what DACA includes.

Um, when we're hiring somebody, is DACA a U.S.

citizen?

Is DACA a permanent resident, or do they have a guaranteed legal status, or they must and they have to reapply every two years for the eligibility?

So I I could ask for those individuals if you like.

Is DOC a U.S.

citizen?

Uh no, it is a designation of a status.

Are DAC a permanent residents?

Uh no, they are DACA recipients.

Um they are the deferred action for childhood arrivals.

Uh do they have to get vetted every two years?

They absolutely do.

Um so they're under a lot of scrutiny because they do go back to then to just go through their process and then get reaffirmed every two years.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yes, sir.

Um follow up to the chief.

So, chief, when we we have our hiring practices here.

Eligibility, um, entry level exams.

Are we falling short on looking for candidates or we not getting the candidates you as you figured a lateral transfer is falling down before we look outside of our hiring practices?

Where are we internally with what we're doing, or where are we falling short?

I wouldn't say that we're full we're falling down or falling short.

I think recruitment is a challenge uh everywhere uh at this time, uh, and it has been for several years.

Um, you know, for for those in the room who aren't sure what we proposed is the police officer standards and training council is the governing body for all police certification in Connecticut.

So while you may be employed by a municipality, your certification as a police officer comes from the state.

They changed the regulations back in 2020 uh for permanent residents, and then uh extended that to DACA in 2025.

Uh what we're looking for is just to make sure that we have the best qualified candidates for uh for the police department.

We have a wonderful community that's uh very supportive of its police department, and it's always my goal to try to put the best players on the field to serve our community.

So if they're legal, if they have the legal status and the eligibility under post standards, we were just trying to make sure that our ordinance didn't prevent good candidates from applying to be police officers.

So if we invest in the individual, train them, you know, as you know what it costs to bring somebody forward to to train them to become a police officer, and their eligibility status is in question every two years, it puts us in a at a at a threshold where you could lose that individual potentially if they're not reapplied or revisited that we could lose an individual for a variety.

I mean, I understand your question, and I think it's a very good question, but we can use lose an individual for a variety of reasons.

I mean, you're you're not obligated to stay with you know with the police department if you just don't like it here and want to go somewhere else, you could do that after a few years.

So you know, the the whole purpose here is to have someone uh we're going to do our best to ensure that they meet all of those requirements, and and if they don't, then we're probably would terminate them anyway.

So uh so I'm not overly concerned about them meeting the status for DACA because that just means staying on the straight and arrow, which we would require of all of our police officers.

Thank you.

And then following it to the chief.

So the other question is is carrying a handgun.

Yes, the allowance of carrying a handgun is only on duty for a DACA recipient, yes, not for permanent legal residents.

Right.

I know the mayor has a quote from you where on I-95 was we're gonna work around as a workaround.

Um I mean, we set we set the precedent for everybody want to leave their gun at work at that point too.

No, we don't.

No.

You're saying individuals have to leave their gun at work.

DACA recipients recipients would have to live.

If every officer said to you we're gonna leave our gun at work, what would you say to them?

That's their prerogative.

Right.

But that's that also changes the dynamic of policing.

No, we have officers not carrying guns off duty.

But we currently authorize police officers to carry their guns off duty.

We do not require them to carry their guns off duty.

So there are many officers who choose not to bring their weapon home.

You know, so and they leave them in their locker, and that's fine.

That's their choice.

It's just the DACA recipients, they would have to.

So there's really no change there.

We don't require officers to carry uh their weapons off duty.

Not a requirement, follow up the chair.

I mean, most probably do for their own protection.

And that's their prerogative.

Right, but it also creates the environment where you may fail to act in the duty of a police officer without being armed in exiting circumstance.

So there's setups looking for.

But again, sir, I I I appreciate your question, but if they're not required to carry their weapons off duty now, then you know, in many cases, they might have to just make the best witness.

Yeah, and you know, to a crime.

But you know, the only way we would get to what you're you're talking about is to require them to carry off duty, and I and I don't think I think that's a bridge too far.

Uh you know, for them to have to carry their guns off duty, you know, to spend a day with their family at the beach and feel that they have to have a weapon with them to go out to the movies and feel that they have to have a weapon with them.

If they're if they want to have it, fine, but they're not required.

I understand that, do the chair.

But there is a code of conduct in the event of an officer failing to act in the commission or observing a crime.

But what's failure to act?

There's there's you know split hairs on this, but right, exactly.

We can split hairs on it.

But the thing is it's still out there.

You'd want to be you want to feel protected with every officer that's and the officers that choose to carry their weapons off duty to get fully involved, could do so, but they're not required to do so at this particular time.

And that would not change with this ordinance.

Thank you.

Follow up.

I'm not going to keep keep going if you I mean he's answered a lot of questions.

They followed to HR.

Yeah.

Yes.

A lot of so liability-wise, insurance-wise, where does this put us for the city of Danbury making different requirements?

Well, if it's following the law, then we're on solid ground for that.

And doing your background checks.

You may not have history on a Docker recipient that may not be here for 16 years of their life.

How do you vet their prior experience, life history?

Well, we do social security trace.

So there would be a uh there would be a social security trace that it would come up.

We have the police officers who do their investigations as well as ours.

Um we do psychologicals and polygraphs, so all of that would stay the same.

If I could do a recipients come in under the age of 16.

I'm sorry.

So they they're going to be here a significant remote.

They're more vetted.

I'm sorry.

They're they're more vetted than some of the folks we're hiring now.

Thanks.

Okay.

And the chief, as far as as far as backgrounds, the way we do background checks now.

I mean, you do random checks, neighbors, friends.

Yes.

It's it's not it's not designated, so somebody doesn't know that they're coming to do a check.

No of background, right?

Um is there you know, there may be the an issue with that as far as checking in history with a recipe.

Not sure what you would mean by uh an issue with that.

I mean, we if we're doing neighborhood canvases for uh current applicants, it would not change with uh permanent legal residents or Docker recipients.

You know, the whole process does not change.

There's there's no lowering of any standards for uh for eligibility, you know, for meeting, you know, getting to the finish line in terms of our background process.

There is a process change in the in the officer by not carrying a gun off duty.

But they don't have to now.

Speak for my personal experience.

So I'm just gonna I think a lot of that was asked and answered, Chief articulated that nothing is changing changing as far as the standards of the potential officer that we are trying to hire.

There is no requirement to carry firearms off duty that is discretionary up to the officers.

So there's no change.

There it I we've heard from all members of the city here that are present that there are no changes.

I will indulge follow-ups if they are a little more pointed to something different, but I think a lot of what you've asked is has has been answered respectfully, sir.

Okay.

Um at corporation council.

I mean, this is thoroughly vetted with corporation counsel.

Yes.

There's no questions.

No, we don't have it.

It's legal to do, we have no problem with it.

Would anything in this ordinance um negatively impact the operations of your department making something a little harder that might not be currently going on?

Then same thing to HR.

Would anything in this ordinance be affecting any of the operations in terms of bringing on personnel?

I'll open it up to members ex officio.

Any questions for our representatives here?

We'll go.

I saw Councilman Sheefer Shanese first, and then we'll go ahead.

Councilman Grottinger.

So it's my understanding.

The thing with the with the Docker recipient having carrying gun not carry gun.

But it's the policy of the Gamburg Police Department, that off-duty police officers, like you said.

They're not required.

They're authorized to carry and under the law enforcement officer safety act, uh, they do have the the uh legal right to carry uh basically anywhere in the country.

But our policy doesn't treat off-duty police officers part of their official duty, if they're off duty.

Yeah, no, if they certainly if they if if something were to happen and then they were to get involved and have to make an arrest, then certainly they would be you know covered.

But according to but our policy says they don't have to.

Since our policy doesn't have to, then for if you're a doctor recipient, they're therefore cannot be carrying a gun.

Correct.

It would as long as it's part of their official duty.

Correct.

But being off duty is not part of their official duty that is correct.

Therefore, they cannot get it.

So they would they would have to turn in their weapons, or policy would have to change to a model.

That is correct.

So if our policy allowed it, they would also have that right as well.

That is correct.

Regardless of whether it be a permanent residency or not.

If our policy allows it, they can as well.

We would have to change our policy in-house.

If we want it to.

If we wanted to, and the state allows it as well.

Yes.

Okay.

That's what I thought it was as well.

But it's also now it's my through the chair.

It's my understanding that a permanent legal resident would be more likely to apply than most likely a Docker resident would be because the pool is a much bigger with the legal resident than a Docker resident.

Because as of 2021, there are no more new Docker recipients allowed because of the rules of changing as well.

So therefore it's only from 21 back.

We'd be dealing with it.

More than likely, yes.

For example, if you go to Danbury Hospital, for example.

There's a lot of doctors there currently on the visas who are permanently, and they are and the doctors.

So we're not anything different than they are in that case.

But this is my only other concern, again, it's not really a concern, but deals with the corporation counsel again through the chair.

Regarding Docker residency.

Which means those who are currently have it can be new to the Supreme Court finally rules on this.

What would happen if the Supreme Court rules in favor of the Fifth District and makes Dock illegal then unfortunately you mean the sub the Supreme Court?

The Supreme Court's the highest correct or the lands.

If that means any officer would be longer be a police officer.

Unfortunately.

Okay.

Because that's still a concern.

I mean that's a concern, yes, but it's a minimal concern at this point.

You would hope.

Yeah, you would hope.

You would hope that's a minimal concern.

But it's still there.

Yes.

Thank you.

Any other members next?

Oh, yep, I'm sorry, Councilman Director.

Thank you.

Um, just for a point of clarity through the chair to the chief.

Um, you referred to um some state laws that were adapted.

Is that what we're attempting here?

Is just to mirror what's currently operational at the state.

Exactly.

The what the police officer standards and training council at two separate uh times in 2020, they extended eligibility to uh permanent legal residents, and in 2025 they further extended it to uh eligibility to DACA recipients, and that is as I explained, our governing body for police officer certification and and that's the standard you're incorporating that's being incorporated into this resolution.

Okay, thank you.

Councilman Play.

Thank you.

How many municipalities currently allow DACA residents to apply to be police officers?

In Connecticut.

I don't have the exact number, but I know it's at probably at least around 15 to 20, if not more.

Um they many have adopted the uh post uh standards and their um for their hiring eligibility.

Uh I know our kind of I always call it our sister city because of population-wise and everything.

Norwalk uh allows for uh permanent residents, uh they follow the post standards, and West Hartford, which is a department just sh just a little bit smaller than ours about authorized for about 140 officers, they also uh have opened it up.

Is it I'm sorry, is it permanent residence or DACA?

Because there is a difference.

Post standards.

Post standards.

Okay, they've extended it for both.

Okay.

Any other members ex officio?

Um I do not have any questions.

Um I do support uh the amend the amendments to the ordinances.

I think adopting uh you know police officer standards and training council is uh for all intents and purposes regarding police, sort of the law of the land.

Um so we're just basically following uh the guidance from the top here.

So I think um it's smart and I uh credit the mayor in his office um for extending the pool because uh like chief said, we want the best of the best, and if this helps us um find some diamonds in the rough that may otherwise not have applied, but for this standard, I think um I think it's a good move.

So um I mean, mayor, you want to same thing, I'll give you the floor if not.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh I just want to you know reiterate a couple points I made um at one point the council meeting, then since we presented this.

Um this is a recruitment tool.

Uh we are not having recruitment challenges in Danbury.

This gives Chief Rittenhauer and HR the ability to recruit more candidates.

Uh they still have to go through all the background checks.

They still have to test high to be considered.

Um, and I stand by this.

Somebody who was a permanent resident, somebody who knows permanent residents who serve in our military, right?

These are folks who raise their right hand to take an oath to sacrifice their lives for our country and our freedom.

And while the AC recipients can't do that now, uh they are saving our lives in so many other fields, right?

This is a job where you put your life on the line.

If somebody cares about our community that much that they're willing to put their life on the line by putting that badge on, because you ever know what your day is going to look like, we should embrace them.

We should encourage them to do that.

Um I don't have uh the concerns I think some folks have, and some of the rhetoric I'm making it clear, not in this room.

I think everybody here is very good people.

Um but there are some racial undertones in the in certain aspects of this, and I would make it clear that it's not what I'm hearing from Councilman Mike Henry.

I think you're asking solid questions with real concerns.

I'm gonna put that on the record, councilman.

Um but like I need you to hear um we could change our policies so these folks could carry um or would have to carry, um, but we don't want to do that.

That's where we understand like the chief said earlier.

Uh he believes that to be a bridge too far, I believe um his his management and how he sees that, and we would stick by that right now.

Um and other communities are doing it.

But let me make this clear make no mistake about it.

Um, if we were the first one to do that, I would still be putting this on here and defending our right to do that as a city because somebody always has to be first.

We shouldn't have to wait to see other people because this is the right thing to do.

Uh, this is the time to do it.

I hope that this gets bipartisan support when the time comes.

Uh we have the very best department in the city, in the city, excuse me, in the state, if not the country, and this will only make us stronger.

Uh so thank you for entertaining the ordinance change.

Thank you for the chief for working closely and being a big supporter of doing what's right.

And I look forward to this ordinance passing and us being able to interview one of our first permanent residents or maybe even DACA Dreamers, who possibly might even come out of the Danbury Police because that program has so many kids already serving this city, right?

Putting a uniform on.

Yes, they're not police officers, but they're putting the uniform on, and they're proud.

And I and I hope I get to we all get to vote on one of them to be police officers one day.

So thank you, Chief.

So thanks for Mayor.

Um we went around the room, we heard from committee members, we heard from members ex officio.

Um that being said, I think we can um do some business and entertain a motion.

Just a general statement for this year.

Sure.

Uh I do believe that even though it's vetted, this is gonna take more time on our part, process.

Um, we don't have to be the first community to do this.

We can see what other communities have done.

We'll see how this develops.

That's as far as coming in to first for us.

But let's take the time and let's see what how it works out with other communities and and put this in front of the public and see what else the public wants to do.

Even though this is an ad hoc public can't speak here, we'll have a public hearing committee as a whole.

And let's see what the other report looks like from everybody else.

So stay final.

Thank you.

Thank you, councilman.

And again, thank you everybody for your questions and for your engagement.

I like when uh ad hocs ask a lot of questions.

That means everybody cares.

So um I do appreciate that.

So thank you, Councilman.

Councilman.

Um, that being said, um public hearing.

Yeah, read procedurally.

Is this going to a public hearing?

Not a committee at the whole, because you have an ad hoc, so just the public hearing.

So it'd be a motion to the public hearing.

Do you send a couple of things?

To recommend recognition public hearing.

You have to go back to council to send it to the public hearing.

All right, so I'll just I'll get I'll need a so move.

Okay, so uh do I hear a motion to recommend that the ordinance as presented go to a public hearing followed by a committee of the whole of the city council?

Is that any of the thoughts?

No committee at the whole community.

All right, so do I have a motion to send the amended ordinance as presented to a public hearing?

So motion so moved.

Seconded.

Okay.

Is there any discussion on the motion?

Hearing none, I'll try your minds.

All those in favor, signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

No sanctions.

Motion carries.

Is there a motion to adjourn?

So move.

So moved, second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed, we are adjourned.

Thank you very much, everybody.