EAST PROVIDENCE — Changes to the application process for prospective candidates seeking to the join the East Providence Police Department were among the first orders of business for the newly seated City Council at its initial meeting of the 2019 session held Tuesday night, Jan. 22.

First-term Ward 4 Councilor Ricardo Mourato, himself an 18-year veteran of the Bristol (R.I.) Police Department, introduced amendments to the existing ordinance on hiring for the EPPD (City Charter, Ordinances, Chapter 12, Police, Article 2 Section 12-18-6: Qualification for Appointment to the Police Department).

He said his rationale for recommending the changes was to broaden the number of people who apply for potential openings.

“Knowing that when I applied to the police department when we had a position open we would have 400 to 600-plus applicants, that is not the case anymore,” Mr. Mourato explained. “Nowadays we see a very limited amount, pool of candidates. Now we typically get, I don’t know about East Providence, but I look across the board and we typically get about 30-40 applicants for some of these positions.”

The amended ordinance gained the first of two necessary passages from the body on a 4-0 vote. A fuller discussion on the proposed changes will likely take place at the council’s next schedule meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 5.

The revised ordinance removes the requirement of applicants to have “at least equal to the completion of an associate degree (60 credit hours) from an accredited college or university” and allows prospective candidates to apply with either a high school diploma or a GED (General Education Degree) equivalent.

“I feel lowering the stand to a high school diploma or equivalency would be beneficial to get more applicants and also some of these applicant’s life experience goes a long way,” Mr. Mourato added, referring to his own circumstances where he was married at 18 years of age, became a homeowner at 19 and father at 22. He said to meet current standards it took him six years to get his associates degree.

As not to dissuade candidates from earning college credits, Mr. Mourato proposed introducing a points system to benefit those who had done so when grading their applications.

In addition, language clarifying the criminal history of an applicant was included. Currently, a candidate who has committed a “crime” could immediately be disqualified. Mr. Mourato’s amendment specifies crime to “felony” going forward.

“The reason for that is we deal with a lot of high school, college kids who have been arrested for simple crimes such as possession of alcohol, those minimum crimes that would disqualify under existing ordinance,” the councilman continued. “A simple mistake made prior I don’t think should hold them back.”

Ward 2 Councilor Anna Sousa, starting her second term in office, questioned whether amending the reference to an applicant’s criminal past was necessary. She implicated if would be especially disconcerting if it potentially involved violence.

“I have a problem with certain misdemeanors being on someone’s record and then them coming into the police department and then them being someone who I’m supposed to trust with my life or my loved ones or my constituents,” Ms. Sousa said. “I know there are various types of misdemeanors, so that could be the vetting process the police department takes. But I don’t know the vetting process because I’m not privy to that. But I am privy to making these kinds of amendments or choices, and I don’t feel comfortable with just a felony. I think there are substantial misdemeanors that I would not something with that on their record being a police officer.”

Mr. Mourato countered, saying the vetting process, the background checks conducted by the EPPD would almost assuredly weed out candidates with any such worrisome acts of their records.

Mr. Mourato said the term “misdemeanor is a broad scope” and that a “felony is a felony. Those are serious crimes.” He added, “The way it reads now, with just ‘crime,’ that eliminates a lot of people.”