Fire Service Staffing
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Ill. voters to decide on 131.95% fire district tax rate increase for ambulance staffing
What it takes to do the job right when you don’t have the people, the time or the margin for mistakes
The brownouts began a year ago as a measure taken by the city to cap overtime
The firefighters allege that they worked thousands of extra hours for as many as 10 years
The union can negotiate the minimum number of firefighters on a shift, because it has a direct impact on safety
The total settlement includes overtime, pension payments and interest
The bonuses come after overtime costs have nearly doubled over the last two years
The fire chief said the figures include pension, benefits and overtime costs
Officials said the firefighter-paramedic earned more than the fire chief and city manager due to an extraordinary amount of overtime
Two firefighters each worked more than 6,000 hours, which amounted to “almost 70 percent of the time they are living and breathing”
During the past four years, the Watertown Fire Department’s overtime has more than doubled
The firefighters said the district should have included not just hourly pay in its calculation of the regular pay rate, but also other compensation
With over half of their staff taking the city’s firefighter exam, the department’s EMS team will have to work overtime
The fire division plans to decrease its overtime by about $60,000 next year and lower the number of firefighters on each shift
Wilmington Fire Chief Anthony Goode said it would cost nearly $100,000 per firefighter to fill the department’s vacancies
The practice, used to halt overtime, was suspended the day after two Wilmington firefighters were killed in a rowhouse fire.
Those payments follow a change in the overtime payment structure after it became clear the city no longer could use what’s known as the “fluctuating work week” method
One city official called the fire department’s overtime budget of $1.48 million unacceptable
