The Denver Civil Service Commission announced the firing of the agency’s executive director on Tuesday night, hours after she had accused Mayor Mike Johnston and city leadership of interfering in her staff’s work vetting new applicants to join the Denver police and fire departments.

During a morning news conference, Niecy Murray appeared alongside three progressive City Council members outside the City and County Building. She alleged that under the Johnston administration, her independent agency had faced political pressure to lower standards and ignore red flags, which would pass more applicants along to fill recruiting classes for public safety departments.

The pressure was driven by promises Johnston made to increase the number of police officers working in Denver while on the campaign trail in early 2023, she said. A city public safety official disputed her allegations.

In the early evening, in a statement sent out by president Amber Miller, the commission said its leaders already had planned to meet with Murray Tuesday to inform her of the decision — made unanimously on May 16 — to “separate” her from the job.

The board did not specify why it had decided to terminate Murray but noted in its statement that it made the decision well before her news conference. The statement characterized Murray’s public comments Tuesday as appearing to be “a preemptive attempt to block or influence her release.”

The statement also disputed any assertion that the board had applied pressure to reduce minimum test scores for police recruits.

“To be clear, the board has never set expectations that the executive director or the commission should operate any way other than independently, and we strongly dispute her claims,” the statement reads.

Originally a commission member herself — appointed by then-Mayor Michael Hancock in 2018 — Murray was tasked with working with the five-member appointed commission to set and apply standards for hiring, promotions and discipline within the ranks of the city’s police and fire departments.

In an interview Tuesday night, Murray said she was caught off guard when told in a mid-afternoon meeting with the commission that she was being fired. She said she was not given details about what lead to that final decision.

“I can tell you it can’t be based on past performance — at least in my opinion — because all of my performance evaluations have been at or exceeding expectations for all of the three and half years I have been in that seat,” she said.

Allegations about minimum standard

On Tuesday morning, Murray was joined at the news conference by council members Shontel Lewis, Sarah Parady and Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez.

According to Murray, the pressure on recruiting standards from Johnston-allied officials manifested in ways that included city leaders asking that the minimum score for a successful police entry exam be lowered significantly. They’d also insisted that an applicant be approved despite a psychological evaluation that deemed that person unfit to proceed.

Murray did not identify who was involved.

“The public’s trust is placed in us to ensure standards for safety are being met,” Murray said on the steps of city hall. “The role of the Civil Service Commission is far too important to be diminished to one which is strictly performative.”

Denver public safety officials pushed back on the idea that the administration was exerting undue pressure on Murray.

As many as 50% of new applicants abandon efforts to join Denver’s police and fire departments before ever receiving a final opinion from the commission, those officials said, because the application process is so long and complicated. They said the longstanding problem was driving away qualified applicants.

“Modernizing the Civil Service Commission process is an essential step in building a diverse, dedicated and highly skilled public safety workforce, and we must make evidence-based changes to that process to make that vision a reality,” Armando Saldate, executive director of the city’s Department of Public Safety, said in a statement.

The commission’s statement later Tuesday said it would continue to review city processes with the goal of speeding up hiring for the police and fire departments, “all while meeting the needs of a skilled, modern workforce.”

The board named Jeannette Giron, the commission’s human resources manager, as interim director.

Appointees chosen by mayor, council

The commission comprises five appointees: two chosen by the mayor, two by the City Council and one approved jointly. The council unanimously voted to re-appoint Noah Stout to the commission in October and did the same for Al Gardner in April, according to city records. Gardner, who ran for mayor last year, was appointed by Johnston to lead the city’s general services department in November.

Miller was nominated by Hancock in 2021 and approved by the council for a term that ends on Dec. 31 of this year. Rounding out the commission are businessman Steve Foster and Gregory Moore, former editor of The Denver Post.

Murray did not take questions at the news conference. The three council members said Murray’s concerns had been raised internally with city leadership, and Murray coming out publicly was a last resort.

Lewis implied that the pressure was being applied largely by commission members and leaders in the city’s public safety department.

“I would like a full investigation into the culture within the commission, their relationships with departmental leadership and what influences decision-making, if not safety,” Lewis said.

DPD in particular has been at the center of costly lawsuits over officer conduct in recent years, especially in the wake of the department’s much-maligned response to the George Floyd racial justice protests in 2020. The City Council signed off on more than $17 million in payments to settle lawsuits against the department in 2023 alone.

Meanwhile, Johnston has been vocal about his commitment to expanding the force to keep up with the needs of a city that has grown substantially over the last 15 years.

In his first city budget, Johnston earmarked $8.2 million to grow the force by 167 officers.

Mark Pogrebin, a professor emeritus with the University of Colorado Denver’s School of Public Affairs, noted that police departments across the country are struggling with recruiting as police conduct comes under more scrutiny and the pressures of the job become more well known.

Pogrebin, who previously led CU Denver’s criminal justice program, said police entry exams have been scrutinized in the past for being designed to exclude minority groups. But if equity concerns are not at issue, he said, he will always favor a department of fewer officers who are highly qualified over one that’s larger, but made up of officers hired under laxer standards.

“There should never be undue pressure from politics to get more cops on the streets,” Pogrebin said. “That’s not going to lower the crime rates, I tell you that.”

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