AURORA, Colo.—Aurora faces a federal inquiry into its hiring practices because too many of its police officers and firefighters are white.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division has told Aurora it will look at city hiring practices because of low numbers of black and Latino public safety employees.
Federal investigators have not mentioned any discrimination complaints. But a letter earlier this month from U.S. Assistant Attorney General Loretta King says the number of nonwhite firefighters and police is disproportionately low. The Police Department is about 4 percent black, and about 3 percent of the Fire Department is black. Latinos make up 6.9 percent of the Police Department’s sworn officers and 5 percent of the firefighters.
By contrast, neighboring Denver has a police force that is more than 20 percent Latino and more than 9 percent black.
Aurora officials acknowledge they struggle to recruit minority officers and say they welcome the probe.
“We have been trying really, really hard to attack the diversity issue forever,” Aurora Police Chief Dan Oates said. “At this point, the Department of Justice intervention will help us with any new ideas and strategies.”
Aurora officials say efforts to recruit more minorities have been stymied by the recession. Signing bonuses for new officers have been cut, and the city’s travel budget to attend job fairs and other recruitment events has been slashes.
Also, the poor economy has led to fewer retirements, making it harder to make changes to the force of public safety officers.
Aurora City Councilwoman Deb Wallace told The Denver Post that the city hopes federal investigators bring ideas to diversify staff without spare dollars for recruitment.
“Truly when you look at the Aurora citizens, there is no match” between diversity in the population and diversity among police and fire officers, Wallace said. “We have set things in place. But it’s taking longer to get done.”
