WIILKES-BARRE - Tensions between the city and its firefighters left the negotiating room at Thursday's City Council meeting as each side continued an ongoing debate over reducing minimum on-duty staffing as part of the city's effort to rein in escalating overtime costs.
Over four days, firefighters have protested and passed out fliers bemoaning the city's decision a week ago to trim minimum staffing to 12 firefighters from 14 to keep the department from exhausting its overtime budget by May. As part of the reduction, the engine based at South Station goes out of service when minimum staffing is in effect.
City officials have remained silent on their position as they engage in negotiations with the firefighters' union, International Fire Fighters Association Local 104, to end the impasse. Last night, Mayor Tom Leighton outlined the city's position as one spurred by an effort to pare down overtime costs that city no longer afford.
In 2009, the city doled out $322,000 to cover minimum staffing overtime, far exceeding the amounts racked up by other departments, such as the approximately $47,000 by city police, he said. And despite raising taxes a year ago, there was no way the city could cover a tab that through two months was on pace to reach $600,000, Leighton said.
"I've done everything in my power, my staff has done everything in its power to keep you safe," he said. "We can't continue down this road."
In general, the department needs 18 firefighters to cover a shift, only calling in overtime help when seven people are unable to work. That meant the city paid overtime to three firefighters, but under the reductions, only one person is required, Leighton said.
Without elaborating, he said members of the union's board had rejected a deal in late December that could have prevented such a reduction.
"You left me with no choice," Leighton said. "I'm not failing you, the city administration is not failing you and city council is not failing you. Your union is failing you."
Before Leighton spoke, ambulance driver Dan Emplit repeated the firefighters' argument before city council that the remaining engines, located at fire headquarters and Hollenback Station, cannot respond quickly enough to calls in South Station's service area, which includes three schools and a high-rise apartment complex.
The drive from Hollenback Station takes 10 minutes in a regular vehicle, a time that will surely be longer in a fire engine to reach a scene or provide hydrant service backing up the first-responding unit, Emplit said.
"Two engines is not enough to cover a city of this size, this number of people and a demographic where the age is increasing," Emplit said. "Any answers? Whose providing coverage?"
Given a chance to offer a rebuttal, Emplit argued that the city only has itself to blame by not hiring firefighters to replace the 19 that left the department over eight years, making it tougher to maintain adequate staffing and increasing reliance on overtime in the process.
"This is not doing more with less," he said. "This is piling on."
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??? If the City spend $322,000 last year to cover shifts because of not hiring men to replace Fire Fighters who have retired, why now say $600,000 ? Nothing has changed except fire protection and safety has been diminished.
http://citizensvoice.com/news/leighton-firefighters-clash-over-staffing-levels-1.673496
