Schererville Town merit board reviews proposed changes to firefighter hiring, testing and discipline rules

Schererville Town merit board members spent an informal meeting reviewing proposed revisions to rules that govern firefighter appointments, testing, promotions and disciplinary procedures, but took no formal votes.

The draft changes, presented by Speaker 1, add language to clarify that part-time firefighters can be construed as "members" for the purposes of the rules and to align application and testing steps with state statute. "I lifted that language straight from the statute, and it's IC 36 8 3.5," Speaker 1 said while explaining the age-exemption language that would exempt previously employed members from the 21–40 age range. Speaker 1 also said the draft requires filing general aptitude test results with the board and allows the board to reject applicants found unqualified on that basis.

Why it matters: the edits affect who may be eligible for hire, how many applicants are interviewed, and which policies can trigger merit-board discipline. The board debated whether statutory terms such as "department" should be read narrowly (only this town's department) or broadly (any unit's fire department) and asked Speaker 1 to research the ambiguity with legal counsel before finalizing language.

On testing and scoring, members discussed imposing numeric benchmarks. Speaker 5 said the recruitment process produced 22 applicants and "4 of them were under 70" on the vendor's combined "fit" score; several members proposed using 70 percent as the passing threshold on the written component and as a benchmark for the oral portion. "70 sounds like a pretty good benchmark," Speaker 1 said. Others warned that relying too heavily on vendor 'fit' indicators could exclude candidates who perform better in person; Speaker 6 noted that several candidates with low fit scores improved during in-person interviews.

Board members also discussed who should serve on interview panels and whether the board should fix that in bylaws. Speaker 3 recommended that the president appoint two members to interview candidates; Speaker 1 said they would draft bylaw language while watching for potential statutory constraints.

The proposal distinguishes three hireable classes—firefighter/paramedic, firefighter/EMT and paramedic-only—and prompted a recruiting discussion. Members noted that budgeted payroll lines do not include an EMT-only full-time slot, making sponsorship or part-time pathways necessary if the board wants to encourage entry-level applicants. "The paramedic can do a lot more for patient care," Speaker 5 said, noting the licensing differences between EMTs and paramedics.

On discipline, Speaker 1 proposed language clarifying that the town personnel policy manual should be treated as department orders so violations listed there may be cause for meritorious discipline under the statute; attorney Austin's earlier advice informed that rewording. The chief's immediate-suspension authority was clarified: the statute permits the chief to suspend a member without pay for up to five working days, and the statute defines a working day as eight hours (effectively 40 hours), Speaker 1 said.

What happens next: Speaker 1 said they will research ambiguities (including the statutory meaning of "department" and the oral-scoring rubric), obtain data from the third-party testing vendor, and circulate a revised draft. The board agreed to notice the revision for a public hearing and return for a formal vote after public comment; no final action was taken at this meeting.

The meeting closed with Speaker 1 asking department leadership to update and circulate an active personnel and seniority list for the board's records.