Copyright 2006 Providence Publications, LLC
By CHELSEA PHUA
The Providence Journal (Rhode Island)
NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. — The town should hire more firefighters, reduce the use of sick time at the Fire Department and take an incremental approach to adding new fire stations, consultants for the town say in a recent report.
The Town Council commissioned a study in August to identify cost-saving measures, to understand the needs of the Fire Department and to improve its operations and response time to emergency calls, Council President Anthony F. Miccolis Jr. said.
The study cost $56,000 and was awarded to Matrix Consulting Group of Waltham, Mass., in September, Town Manager Richard Kerbel said. The group has several offices nationwide, including its headquarters in California.
“Public safety is an extremely high priority,” Miccolis said. The town will do all it can to ensure the safety of its citizens, but it also wants to make sure its decisions are fiscally prudent, “given the financial parameters,” he said.
The council will discuss the 237-page report, made available late Friday afternoon, at its work session tonight.
Fire Chief David A. Murray said he does not want to comment on the report until the meeting is over and the council has had a chance to address it.
The consultants found that current staffing is inadequate. They concluded that the use of sick leave in the department is high compared with those of the Police Department and other fire agencies in the Northeast. As a result, overtime is being expended to meet staffing targets on a regular basis, they said.
The consultants recommended the department’s command staff evaluate the use of sick time by each employee and note any unusual patterns. In addition, they suggested recruiting eight additional firefighters. Personnel costs would replace overtime costs but would also offset them, saving the town $160,000 a year, the report said.
However, Miccolis said that when the town went into arbitration with the firefighters union over health insurance coverage two years ago, the arbitrator determined there was an adequate level of personnel. Increasing the department by 16 firefighters would cost the town $1.6 million a year, Miccolis said.
The council president said improving the department’s response time is not about having more personnel, but is about the distribution of resources. Some areas of town, especially the Slocum and Saunderstown sections, are not covered as well as they should be, Miccolis said.
The consultants evaluated 12 sites where the town could locate fire stations, including the three sites that already have facilities — two along Post Road and one on Boston Neck Road. They analyzed different scenarios and numbers of stations to determine the most cost-effective move that would also improve the department’s response time.
The consultants recommend keeping the two Post Road stations and replacing the Boston Neck Road station with a new one at the intersection of Routes 1 and 138. Subsequent additions — one in Quonset and another on Indian Corner Road — should be done in stages if the town decides to have five fire stations, the report said.