The ban, proposed by state Rep. John Stone, R-Fairfield, would prohibit felons from becoming firefighters, police officers or state troopers. Stone said he acted on a request from City Council member Donna Curran, R-130, after one of her constituents suggested the legislation.

"I was really shocked that they could hire felons" as firefighters, she said.

A petition favoring a ban on such hiring has been signed by thousands of people around the state, Curran said.

Firefighters can enter homes without a search warrant, according to Stone, raising trustworthiness concerns for those hired.

"The key word is trust," he said.

Felons are already barred from being hired as police officers and corrections officers because they cannot carry firearms.

The American Medical Response ambulance service also won't hire felons because medics handle drugs, Stone said.

A felony is a serious, but not necessarily violent, crime carrying a prison term of at least one year.

Ralph Jacobs, the city's personnel director, supports the measure, which is with the Legislature'sJoint Committee on Public Safety and Security.

But the proposed legislation will die if not released from a legislative committee by today, Stone said.

Last June, Jacobs scrapped a long-standing, but unofficial policy barring felons from applying for city firefighter jobs. The Civil Service Commission then placed three felons on the hiring list, using the state's standard of case-by-case review.

Earl King Jr., who bagged crack cocaine for the Peeler brothers' drug ring, is the highest ranked felon at 27th on the firefighter hiring list, or seven spots away from being hired.

Of the other felons, one has a larceny conviction and the other drugs.

The next-highest-ranking felon is tied with eight others for 64th on the hiring list.

Sixteen have been hired off the list and are slated to start April 3, Jacobs said.

In a letter to Mayor John M. Fabrizi, Jacobs said he believes in forgiveness, but agreed with Stone that there is a trust issue.

"There are many other jobs that rehabilitated felons can perform that do not require the very high standard of trustworthiness that a firefighter job demands," he wrote.

After researching the issue, he learned that other communities do not have a policy on the hiring of felons as firefighters.

"This is much too important a matter to be left to such a flimsy standard," Jacobs said.

"The Legislature would be doing the municipal governments and, more importantly, the residents of the state, an enormous service by creating a uniform standard of competency in this area," Jacobs said.

At a February public hearing in Hartford, most speakers supported the hiring ban, Stone said; the only critic was an unidentified Bridgeport firefighter.

The city's firefighter hiring list expires two years after the date of the first hire.

Aaron Leo, who covers regional issues, can be reached at 330-6222.