By Martin B. Cassidy
Staff Writer
December 29, 2005
The Greenwich Fire Depart-ment cut back the number of firefighters it keeps on duty at the North Street and Central fire stations last week to preserve dwindling overtime funds, but staffing was returned to normal after two days when union leaders raised safety concerns.
"They were running out of overtime money," said Lt. John Novak, president of the Greenwich Firefighters Asso-ciation Local 1042, which represents 97 career firefighters. "They need to go back to the RTM and get more money."
Two firefighters were pulled from both the North Street and Central fire stations to help stretch the $100,000 or so left of the department's $770,000 2005-06 overtime budget, Assistant Fire Chief Mike Puterbaugh said yesterday.
The stations normally each have one four-man team of firefighters to staff engines, and the Central station has an additional two-man team that also responds to fires with another engine.
"I went to the assistant chief and expressed concerns about safety," Novak said. "Instead of four-men engines you have two-men engines and that's a concern for the citizens, the firefighters, and the community."
The union points to a federal Occupational and Health Safety Administration law requiring a minimum of four firefighters to form a crew to fight a fire to bolster its case, Novak said.
The law allows firefighters to enter a structure with fewer than four firefighters present only if they believe there is a threat "immediately dangerous to life and health."
A panel of three state fire chiefs that reviewed the circumstances of a Dec. 2003 fire which seriously injured three firefighters recommended the department improve firefighting operations by forming larger crews, either by consolidating firefighters onto fewer engines or hiring more personnel.
This year's overtime budget of $770,145 is too little, Novak and Puterbaugh both said.
In the fiscal year concluded in July, the town logged about $1 million in overtime to replace firefighters out injured, sick, or on vacation, Puterbaugh said.
Puterbaugh said in recent years the fire department has had to shift money from other parts of its budget or ask for additional appropriations to pay overtime.
At the department's current size, Puterbaugh said a $1 million overtime budget from the town would not be exorbitant.
"I tend to believe that $1.2 million is a realistic number we should be operating at, given our current staffing levels, yes," Puterbaugh said. "With two more people eligible for vacation at any time, long term injuries, and family medical leave, it impacts our overtime usage because we have to cover those positions."
Fire Chief Sandy Anderson and First Selectman Jim Lash could not be reached for comment yesterday.
Puterbaugh, who also is director of operations for the department, said he agreed to restore normal staffing last week, pending a Jan. 4 meeting with union leaders. But he also said staffing at the stations could be reduced again after the meeting.
"There is no saying we won't reduce staffing again at that time," Puterbaugh said.
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