Boulder Firefighter Collective Bargaining Charter Amendment

Ordinance 8761, which the City Council adopted on August 6, 2026, asks voters to add Section 73 to the city's Home Rule Charter. Section 73 gives full-time firefighters, up through the rank of battalion chief, the right to bargain collectively with the city, and it recognizes International Association of Firefighters Local 900 as their exclusive representative. The city's ballot page says these rights "currently exist in contract, and the right to take disagreements to impasse is currently in a city ordinance." The city and the union wrote this version together after the union petitioned in April for a broader amendment. The union withdrew the petition on July 24.

Bargaining covers safety, compensation, benefits, promotions, hours, leave, grievance procedures, discipline appeals and all other terms of employment not reserved to management. Firefighters may not strike.

Section 73 reserves to the city decisions on hiring, training, layoffs, discipline, technology, work locations and "the Department’s budget, organization, and the merits, necessity and level of any activity or service provided by the city." The city may bargain over those subjects but need not, and they do not go to fact-finding or a vote. The city must still bargain over shift scheduling and over the procedures it uses for promotions, layoffs and discipline. Reserving budget decisions to the city does not bar bargaining over minimum staffing. When a collective bargaining agreement conflicts with a city rule, policy or ordinance that applies only to city employees, the agreement prevails. Any multi-year agreement must carry a non-appropriations clause to comply with TABOR, the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights in the Colorado Constitution.

Either side may declare an impasse any time after 45 days from the first bargaining session. The two sides then choose an advisory fact finder by agreement or from a list the American Arbitration Association or a similar organization supplies. The fact finder holds a hearing and recommends either the city's final offer or the union's on each issue. If either side rejects any of the recommendations, the two final offers on every unresolved issue go to Boulder's voters at a special election. Voters must choose one of the two, and the offer that wins a majority binds both parties. The side that rejects the recommendations pays for that election; if both reject them, they split the cost. If unrelated issues also appear on the same special-election ballot, the union pays only its proportionate share of election expenses. Section 73 sets aside, for these elections, the state law requiring at least 90 days between a special election and a regular municipal election.

The city's fiscal note reports "no direct fiscal impact of this charter change." If voters approve, Section 73 takes effect January 1, 2027, and supersedes any existing ordinances, policies or procedures on firefighter bargaining. The present agreement with Local 900 stays in force until it expires December 31, 2027. Once the right is in the charter, only another charter amendment that voters approve can change it.