KINGSFORD — Voters will be asked Tuesday to rescind Kingsford’s Civil Service Act, which was authorized in a city vote in 1951.

City Manager Mike Stelmaszek approached the city council at a meeting this summer to suggest it again be brought to the voters because the act’s provisions make it difficult for Kingsford to hire public safety officers. In July, the city council approved a resolution to place it on the November ballot.

“Municipalities that do not have this process can advertise for a position, interview, test, then clear a candidate with the state regulating authorities, hire the candidate and send them to an academy,” Stelmaszek said. “Under the civil service process, there is an application and testing process to get on a list. Once a civil service hiring list is established, the city must use this list over a two-year period to select candidates to be cleared by the state regulating authority before they can be hired and sent to an academy. No one wants to go through this process and wait for the outcome when they can be actively recruited, vetted by state regulations, and then hired by a municipality that does not use the civil service process.”

The Civil Service Act, Act 78, is part of Public Acts approved the state in 1935. It provided for the establishment of a civil service board of commissioners to conduct examinations and investigations as to an applicant’s merit, efficiency, and fitness for employment. There are three members on Kingsford’s Civil Service Commission — Jerome Palmcook, Vernon Miller and Roland Beeck.

The act also provided for the regulation of the transfer, reinstatement, suspension and discharge of police and fire officers.

Since then, through collective bargaining agreements between the city and public safety department union, the city’s Civil Service Commission is now only used for the selection of entry-level employees and for matters concerning the administration of the public safety department, Stelmaszek said.

He noted that minimum hiring and employment standards are regulated by the Michigan Coalition of Law Enforcement Standards and the Fire Fighters Training Council for the city’s public safety officers. The city’s personnel committee can handle matters involving the administration, he said.

A vote to rescind the Civil Service Commission in 2003 failed to pass.

“Circumstances have worsened since then, necessitating the need to, once again, bring the issue to the citizens of Kingsford,” Stelmaszek said.