The Pittsfield City Council is scheduled to take up a petition Tuesday to formally adopt the city’s Affirmative Action Policy as an ordinance.

The petition’s supporters say the recently revived policy has been largely ignored since it was introduced in the early 1990’s. And that despite Pittsfield’s changing demographics, people of color continue to be virtually shut out of city jobs. Adopting the policy as an ordinance, they say, would make it legally enforceable. That concerns Mayor Dan Bianchi.

“When you put something in place as a law, you want to make sure that you’re not exposing the city to undue legal matters,” Bianchi says.

Bianchi says the affirmative action policy should first be allowed to work and be tested. He claims 18% of new city hires have been people of color since the policy’s revival last spring.