San Angelo civil service commission removes flawed promotional questions, orders regrading

SAN ANGELO, Texas — The San Angelo Civil Service Commission voted to remove several flawed questions from recent sergeant and lieutenant promotional exams and directed staff to recalculate scores.

The commission began by removing three contested questions from the sergeant exam after staff identified questions that were taken from source material not posted with the exam. Commissioners said removing the items and recalculating on the reduced scale was the fairest remedy for that set of errors.

Commissioners then considered several other contested items. On question 50 (robbery), which drew conflicting interpretations about the penal-code wording, the commission accepted both answer A and B as correct for candidates on both the sergeant and lieutenant exams after discussion about how test takers might reasonably interpret the phrasing.

A separate question about whether Criminal Investigations Division (CID) investigators must be called to the scene for the death of a child at a specific age was missed by every candidate. Staff noted the question quoted department policy, while multiple officers said everyday practice differs from that written policy. The commission removed that item from scoring.

The commission also addressed one sergeant question that cited the San Angelo Code of Ordinances (chapter 8, section 8.12.002) concerning when an abortion is unlawful. Test writers and commissioners agreed that candidates who selected either the verbatim code phrasing or the “all of the above” choice should be awarded credit; the commission directed staff to grant those points.

Turning to lieutenant appeals, the commission found that questions 81–100 were drawn from a book that had not been posted as source material. Test riders had proposed multiple remedies, including providing a replacement 20-question set or awarding points; commissioners voted to remove those 20 questions and grade the lieutenant exam on the remaining 80 questions. Staff said recalculation of grades would be completed and posted the same day.

Commissioners and line officers called for changes to the test-review process. “The integrity of these tests is very important to us,” said Veronica Sanchez, the city HR director, urging tighter oversight of test writers’ source lists. Officers who had taken the exams described the stress and career implications of the errors; Sergeant Antoine Callum, who filed a formal appeal, told the commission, “Accountability is fundamental” and asked for a tangible remedy.

The commission also voted to remove or award credit on several other lieutenant items where wording or keys were incorrect and asked staff to document steps to avoid recurrence. The meeting ended after the chair instructed staff to publish recalculated scores and said the commission would follow up on improvements to the test-review process.