By Tony Holt
Hernando Today
BROOKSVILLE, Fla. — As the strains of the job pile up, Jason Brazinski feels the need to vent.
When the veteran Hernando County firefighter and paramedic wants to get something off his chest, whether it is an uncooperative patient or a response to a domestic call involving a drunken, jealous husband, he often expresses himself on his Facebook page.
Most Facebook pages are private and only viewed by those the users included on the “friends list.”
Brazinski, who is president of the union, has kept his page public.
On Aug. 20, he posted two entries that referred to residents as “dirtbags.” It was accessible to anyone with Internet.
He now wishes he had picked a softer word.
“It was probably wrong to use that expression,” he said. “We often see cases when people assault females and that really bothers us. It wears on you after a while.”
The union president also posted an entry that day boasting about the upcoming labor negotiations with the county.
“Negotiation prep work complete,” Brazinski wrote. “Unemployment high, economy in the tank, lots of anti-government sentiment, uncertainty all around ... so what’s my mood towards the County Administrator, HR Director and Fire Chief?? Just bring it!!!”
He said he often uses the Internet while at work, but the network access at the station is paid for by the firefighters. They also use their personal laptops. The desktop computers in the station only are used for work-related data entry, he said.
“I would say 70 to 80 percent of my friends on there are firefighters,” Brazinski said. “It’s our way of keeping in touch with each other.”
Fire Chief Mike Nickerson said firefighters have a “liberalized policy” involving Internet usage while on the job because of so much downtime between calls.
He said as long as his employees are not violating medical records confidentiality laws or using threatening language, they are welcome to post anything they want on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or any other community Web site.
“This is America and they have First Amendment rights,” said Nickerson. “We have to respect those rights.”
He also said he might investigate whenever postings are made while employees are “on the clock,” but mostly if they were accessing adult material or other objective subject matter.
In one of his “dirtbag entries,” Brazinski described a call involving inappropriate sexual activity that led to arguing and a boyfriend striking his girlfriend, who was injured during the attack.
“Once again,” he wrote at the end of it. “I LOVE my job.”
Assistant County Administrator Larry Jennings said as long as someone is speaking as an individual, such posts are acceptable.
“We wouldn’t have any rules that would restrict their speech in a public forum,” he said.
If the person identifies himself as a Hernando County firefighter, the rules might be different, Jennings said.
Brazinski identifies Hernando County Fire Rescue as his employer on the “info” portion of his Facebook page.
The Hernando County Sheriff’s Office has a policy that centers on social and interactive networks along the lines of Facebook, Twitter and Web blogs.
“Members shall not depict themselves or another agency member through any Internet medium ... in a way that identifies the member as being employed and-or affiliated with the Hernando County Sheriff’s Office and displays or represents photos, wording or content which is unethical, slanderous, derogatory or is likely to adversely affect the discipline, good order, or reputation of the agency, or that tends to compromise the integrity of the member,” according to the department’s Web-posting policy.
Nickerson, when contacted for the story, said he had not read Brazinski’s entry nor been told about it. A copy of the transcript was faxed to him, but he did not return a message for comment.
Brazinski said he has no plans to make his Facebook page private, but he intends to be more careful with what he posts.
“I need to do a good job of being very particular with what I put on there,” he said.
Copyright 2009 Hernando Today