The Springfield City Council approved a change in the hiring policy for the police department and an ordinance to prevent obstruction of fire hydrants.

Police Chief Paul Wynn told the council he felt requiring a three-year contract when hiring a certified officer was preventing attracting quality candidates.

Wynn said he would still require contracts by officers Springfield sends to training but no longer wants to require a contract when hiring certified officers.

“I’m getting a lot of feedback from a lot of other municipalities that we’re not getting quality applicants because they’re afraid of getting locked into a contract if they’re already certified,” he said.

Wynn said two officers who previously worked in Springfield were great officers who had the “opportunity to better themselves as far as money and college” would be willing to work part time for the city.

“I think that’s going to benefit us much more with where we’re at now,” he said. “Applicants I’ve been getting are not certified, or they’re not Springfield quality.”

Wynn said there have been quality non-certified applicants apply.

“The crunch we’re in now we need a certified officer on the street,” he said. “If we were a year or so from now, and we knew exactly what we were going to run, and what kind of manpower we were going to needed at the time and had budgeted for it, I would say let’s go on and hire a couple of guys.”

Fire Chief Edwin Rahn requested the council approve an ordinance to prevent the obstruction of fire hydrants.

“This ordinance was not brought up due to any particular case,” Rahn said. “Over the past several years, we have been seeing the hydrants with bushes grown up around them, and other things.”

Rahn said this was making some hydrants impossible for firefighters to see when driving down the road.

“There is (a hydrant) on Railroad Avenue that is hidden by a bush,” he said.

He said if a firefighter does not know the hydrant is there, he is not going to find it.

The ordinance calls for nothing immovable to be placed or maintained that would prevent proper use of the hydrant, or prevent the hydrant from being visible from 100 feet down the road.

Rahn said there are cases of flowerbeds, chain link fences and other objects around fire hydrants that would prevent proper use of the hydrant in the event of a fire.

The ordinance passed unanimously.