Griffith Had Poor Test Score on Promotion Test

SAN ANGELO, TX — Travis Griffith, a candidate for police chief, garnered a low score on a promotional exam from sergeant to lieutenant, as indicated by records at the City of San Angelo.

In September 2019, Griffith, alongside three peers, all sergeants with similar years of service, undertook the San Angelo Police Department Promotional Exam for Lieutenant. The test necessitates a minimum of 70 percent correct answers to pass. Griffith scored 64, the lowest of the four taking the exam that day.

However, State of Texas civil service statutes permit an officer to augment their test score by one point for each year of service, up to 10 years. With over a decade of service, Griffith could add those points, achieving a passing score of 74.

By the time of the test in 2019, the San Angelo Coalition of Police had declined a pay raise from the City of San Angelo, terminating its Meet & Confer contract. The police sought higher pay than the City administration was willing to provide. The Meet & Confer contract permits negotiation of standards and pay for all police officers by the city and its civil servants on the police force.

Enhancing standards for test scores for promotions was accomplished in the revitalization of the Meet & Confer Contract enacted on January 1 of this year.

Under present standards, due to his actual test score of 64, Griffith would be ineligible for promotion from sergeant to lieutenant, as the Meet & Confer contract mandates a minimum test score of 70 without any additional points for years of service.

"Officers who achieve a score of 70% or higher on the Sergeant’s or Lieutenant’s written promotional examination, exclusive of seniority points, will advance to the next phase of the examination process, which is an Assessment Center," state the new San Angelo Police Department civil service rules in the Meet & Confer contract. 

"I did take the exam and passed with a 74 due to seniority points," Griffith remarked regarding his low test score. "We did not have a contract at that time and fell under normal civil service law."

In 2022 and 2023, the San Angelo City Council assembled a City Charter Review Committee to deliberate on eliminating the election for police chief and instead empowering the city manager to appoint a chief with council approval. During this process, retired Municipal Judge Allen Gilbert chaired the charter review committee. The committee proposed that the city retain the elected chief position but establish minimum standards for a police officer to run for police chief. No member of the charter review committee or city council at the time anticipated San Angelo voters would relinquish their right to elect a police chief. Establishing minimum standards for candidates thus became the committee’s alternative proposal.

Initially, the charter review committee recommended that the minimum rank for eligibility on the ballot for police chief should be lieutenant with at least five years of experience in that rank. Presently, Griffith remains a sergeant, and the original proposed charter change would disqualify him from the ballot. Councilwoman Karen Hesse-Smith and Councilman Tommy Hiebert dissented from the charter committee’s recommendation and argued in open session in February 2023 to lower the requisite rank from lieutenant to sergeant.

At that juncture, Sgt. Griffith was already orchestrating support for his 2024 bid for police chief.

Hesse-Smith expressed concern that mandating the rank of lieutenant would narrow the pool of eligible candidates for police chief from 60 — 52 sergeants and 8 tenured lieutenants — to merely 8 tenured lieutenants. Hiebert concurred, noting that San Angelo voters had previously elected a sergeant as their police chief. Council unanimously approved lowering the standard for any police chief candidate from a 5-year tenured lieutenant to sergeant. The charter change received voter approval in May 2023.

The last sergeant elected San Angelo police chief was Tim Vasquez.

Ironically, the fears Hesse-Smith and Hiebert expressed a year ago did not materialize. Griffith is running against two tenured lieutenants.