By Amanda Kawalek
The Columbus Dispatch (Ohio)
Copyright 2006 The Columbus Dispatch
All Rights Reserved
A Columbus firefighter who worked with an anti-drug program should be fired, the fire chief recommended yesterday, because he refused to take a random drug test.
Firefighter Carl Page had tested positive for drugs in 1999, and at the time he signed an agreement that he could be dismissed if he failed or refused another test.
Safety Director Mitchell Brown will decide whether to end Page’s 23-year career, based on Fire Chief Ned Pettus Jr.'s recommendation.
“When you are notified that you need to take a random drug test, you cannot avoid it,” said Battalion Chief Doug Smith, the Fire Division’s spokesman. “If for any reason you do, it is considered a positive test.”
After his first offense on Aug. 20, 1999, Page completed a mandatory counseling program and signed a “last chance agreement” with the division, Smith said.
Page skipped a drug test March 15, the same day he represented Firefighters Against Drugs at Second Avenue Elementary School, according to a list of charges Executive Officer Warren Cox sent to Page.
“I think it’s unfortunate,” Smith said, “and it’s a little bit of an embarrassment to the department, especially because he was working with (the anti-drug program).”
Page, 53, was instructed to meet with the EMS coordinator after the program, Cox wrote in the charges, but he left at the end of the day and went off-duty for “an extended period of time.”
Page can appeal if he is fired, said Jack Reall, president of the firefighters’ union.
“There are procedures to follow, and in this case, I don’t think they were,” he said. “You should never have a system where someone could wiggle between the lines and get around the testing, and you shouldn’t have an administration that allows for failure.”