Public Safety & Civil Service

Few careers offer more opportunities for self-fulfillment than service as a police officer. Our officers play a vital role in maintaining safety and welfare in the City of Cambridge, but understand that law enforcement is a service career at its core. Policing is as much about helping people and maintaining and enhancing quality of life as it is about enforcing laws.

Our officers are often viewed as partners in continual touch with the communities they serve. This requires officers who are adept at fostering relationships and building connections between people and groups. Officers should come prepared to think and solve problems with a broad community and relate to the community in a way that facilitates their ability to collect, analyze, and share critical information and resources.

For more information on the process of becoming a Cambridge Police Officer, including important Civil Service Examination dates and requirements, visit this page.

Becoming a Firefighter is a noble, rewarding, and exciting profession where you have the opportunity to help people when they are vulnerable. In addition to firefighting, the job includes a wide variety of skills including emergency medical care, control of hazardous materials releases, protection of the environment, extrication of trapped people (and animals), collapse rescue, water rescue, public fire education, fire prevention, and more.

Firefighting skills include hose line movement, nozzle operation, water supply, search and rescue, use of SCBA (self-contained breathing apparatus), ladder work, forcible entry, fire tactics and strategy, and much more.

Cambridge firefighters will be academy trained and certified to the national Firefighter I/II level.

Firefighter hiring is started via the MA Human Resources statewide entrance examination. For more information on becoming a Cambridge firefighter and the hiring process please visit this page.

Emergency Telecommunication Dispatchers deliver an essential service to the community; they provide public safety communications for fire, police, EMS, and utility services as well as answer and process emergency 9-1-1 and non-emergency calls for service.

Those who live, work, and enjoy spending time in the City of Cambridge can rest assured that their calls for assistance are handled rapidly, professionally, and compassionately by a highly trained and qualified Emergency Telecommunications Dispatcher.

Learn more about working as an Emergency Telecommunication Dispatcher, view the Emergency Telecommunications Dispatcher Hiring Guide.