By Sofi Zeman
The Kansas City Star
KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Kansas City, Kansas, firefighters may not get a chance to tell county officials about their public safety concerns face-to-face, according to a recent court ruling.
A federal judge in Topeka denied the KCK fire union’s request to temporarily suspend rules keeping them from speaking directly with Wyandotte County officials about budget concerns affecting their abilities to do their jobs.
The KCK Fire Fighters Association, IAFF Local 64, did not make a strong enough case showing that it can succeed because “the Association has not clearly established the injury-in-fact prong of standing,” Judge Toby Crouse wrote in his order.
“It neither identified law requiring the Government to create a place on a governing body’s meeting agenda or that it lacks access to the public-comment channels that remain open to it,” the order added.
KCK’s fire union files federal lawsuit
Back in early August, KCK’s fire union filed a federal lawsuit against the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and KCK over an alleged violation of the union’s First Amendment rights.
The lawsuit follows a months-long disagreement with the local government after it said that union members were not allowed to directly speak with elected officials about staffing and safety concerns ongoing within the department.
The Unified Government threatened legal action against Local 64 if members tried to do so, given they believed allowing union members to speak directly to county commissioners about staffing would violate state labor laws.
The government maintained that laws bar union members from lobbying elected officials on contract matters, such as staffing. Only people designated to negotiate contract matters may do so, it told The Star earlier this month.
But the union disagreed, and filed the lawsuit hoping that it would keep the Unified Government from standing in members’ way of talking to elected officials as they ready to set their budget for the 2027 year.
Had they received that temporary restraining order, it would’ve forced the government to allow members to speak.
“When discussions about safety and matters of public concern are repeatedly shut down, they believe the legal system is the only remaining path to ensure these important public safety concerns are heard,” said Jacob Miller, an attorney representing Local 64 said in a news release that initially announced the lawsuit.
Firefighters’ previous concerns with staffing
Firefighters have previously brought up concerns over short staffing within the Kansas City, Kansas Fire Department, particularly following county commissioners’ 2024 vote to freeze property tax revenues in 2025, a move that required millions in government cuts.
They’ve told county commissioners that the department failed to meet minimum staffing recommendations and that it consistently fell behind on federal emergency response time standards.
In his order, Crouse wrote that even had Local 64 made a strong case, the fact that they didn’t seek emergency court action, in a situation they called time-sensitive, earlier on, “undercuts its attempt to show irreparable harm.”
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