http://www.greenwichtime.com/news/local/scn-gt-newposts1mar25,0,993635.story?coll=green-news-local-headlines
By Martin B. Cassidy
Staff Writer
March 25, 2006
The Greenwich Fire Department has chosen four new deputy chiefs, a new post that is expected to eliminate confusion about the chain of command at fire scenes.
The new commanders will run the day-to-day firefighting operations, resolving confusion among career lieutenants and volunteer district chiefs who show up at a fire scene and can't determine who is in charge, Assistant Fire Chief Mike Puterbaugh said.
The new positions were recommended in a report ordered by First Selectman Jim Lash after a December 2003 fire in which five firefighters were injured, three of them seriously, when they were forced to jump from a fourth-story window of a burning house while searching for two missing children.
"This is an overdue change and a move in the right direction for the town and the department," said Puterbaugh, who broke both his legs in that fall. "This will not diminish the role of the volunteers in the town but puts a clear chain of command in place for fire scenes."
The four new deputy chiefs are Lts. Bob Kick and Tom Nixon, and firefighters Keith Millette and Brian Koczak, Puterbaugh said.
Fire Chief Sandy Anderson, and the department's two assistant fire chiefs, Puterbaugh and Joseph Benoit, will remain the department's highest-ranking officials.
Anderson and the new deputy chiefs could not be reached for comment yesterday.
In the February 2004 repor t, a panel of three fire chiefs from other towns concluded that insufficient supervision and an ambiguous chain of command hindered the department's response to the Davis Avenue fire.
The panel recommended creating the new deputy chief positions so someone with authority over lieutenants, volunteer district chiefs and officers, and other paid firefighters would be at all fires.
The chiefs will earn $88,496 a year, Puterbaugh said.
To avoid any appearance of favoritism, the four chiefs will be reassigned to new firefighting teams, so they will not be in command of their longtime squad-mates, Puterbaugh said.
"It's a lot cleaner to go to a new shift without any old relationships or baggage with you," Puterbaugh said. "It removes some of the mud from the waters and allows everyone a fresh start."
Cos Cob Volunteer Fire Department Chief Thomas Anderson, co-chairman of the Greenwich Volunteer Fire Chief's Association, said that volunteer chiefs have not been told whether they will be subordinate to the deputy chiefs.
Currently, the Town Charter places volunteer district chiefs as second in command only to the chief of the department.
"The charter says we report to the chief and not even to the deputy chief," Anderson said. "We're waiting for them to tell us how this impacts us."
Currently, there are four career lieutenants with equal authority who can direct firefighting operations on each 24-hour shift, according to fire officials.
The first lieutenant to arrive on a fire scene takes command, unless a higher ranking officer, such as a deputy chief, intervenes.
One deputy chief will work on each 24-hour shift, and respond to fire calls to direct the response of personnel, but also oversee a variety of other management tasks such as special projects and training exercises, Puterbaugh said.
Lt. John Novak, president of Greenwich Firefighters Association Local 1042, said the addition of the chiefs was an improvement.
Novak said the union would next like to see lieutenants put on every engine each shift, with four firefighters on each engine.
"This is a move in the right direction for the department to resolve the chain of command," Novak said.
Copyright © 2006, Southern Connecticut Newspapers, Inc.