“STATE OF EMERGENCY”
December 20, 2007
This letter appeared in the Sakonnet Times newspaper on 12/20/2007
Fire protection for the
town of Little Compton has declined to a point where we seriously doubt its
ability to protect our community from the ravages of fire.
We have witnessed
erosion over the last decade, accelerated in more recent years by
Management/Labor problems that have seen Fire Chiefs passing through the
Public Safety Complex like a revolving door.
As if the decline of
the LCFD is not bad enough, we have also witnessed dwindling Volunteer Fire
Department membership, coupled with accompanying minimal volunteer responses
to emergency calls. This is apparently a normal evolution when “paid
firefighters” are introduced into small rural municipal fire departments.
The situation has
deteriorated to the point where mutual aid is now virtually automatic on all
first alarm calls. Normally other town fire departments are not asked to
respond for assistance unless a structure fire calls for assistance above
and beyond the capabilities of a local fire department.
A mere 20 years ago saw
a robust and highly effective Volunteer Fire Department with more than 50
members. Now we have an expensive new fire station, an expensive new fire
truck, 9 full-time paid firefighters, a Fire Chief, a million dollar budget,
and a fire department falling apart at the seams. There is something wrong
with this picture.
The untimely
resignation of Fire Chief Harry Hallgring Jr. has left a top level
management vacuum at the Fire Department.
Apparently Captain Donald Medeiros has reluctantly accepted the Town
Councils appointment as temporary acting Fire chief. We certainly can
understand why Capt Medeiros is reluctant to take on this difficult burden
in the twilight of his 20-plus years of service on the floundering LCFD.
Now the beleaguered
Town Council faces the task once again of having to recruit and hire a new
Fire Chief. Are we hiring a new Commanding Officer for the Titanic?
It has been said that
the definition of insanity as doing the same thing over and over again while
expecting a different result.
Clearly it is a time for change from “top to bottom” at the fire department.
We cannot afford to stagger into the future and believe that somehow
things will get better. To expect a “new Fire Chief” to charge into town,
work magic, and bring about change is unrealistic.
When asked about his single biggest problem, former Chief Hallgring
stated that “The men have a bad attitude”.
Our research indicates that the fire department has produced the
highest number of union grievances by a wide margin.
We believe that Chief Hallgring is right on the money.
The Town Council needs
to “Declare a State of Emergency” for the lack of adequate fire protection
here in Little Compton… The council needs to call upon all available
resources and expertise in dealing with personnel and manpower problems. We
need to call for help from our Mutual Aid Partner Fire Departments, the
State and National Association of Fire Chiefs, the National Fire Protection
Association, and a fully accredited professional Fire Protection Consultant.
The Town can no longer
afford the deluge of newspaper articles exposing the dirty laundry of our
fire department. We can no longer afford the virtual flood of union
grievances that consume valuable time, energy, taxpayers dollars, and the
resultant diversion of our town leaders from performing their other
important governmental responsibilities.
Where do we go from
here? The Taxpayers Association cannot answer that gritty question. We leave
that task to the experts. But it does not take an expert to recognize when
something is broken; getting it fixed is another question. The fire
fighters' union has amassed and enormous amount of power.
Read their contract (www.LCTaxpayers.com) and see for yourself.
We see that as one of the primary sources of the problems we are
experiencing. Maybe that would
be a good place to start given that the contract expires on June 30, 2008.
We believe that there
have to be viable alternatives, and that the town leaders need to explore
all possibilities up to and including privatizing or contracting with
another community for fire protection. We can no longer tolerate
sub-standard service with a million dollar price tag.