Posts Tagged Fire Chief Tom Wendt

Merrionette Park Fire Department (more)

Excerpts from the ChicagoTribune.com:

The Merrionette Park Fire Department is apparently in revolt after the village didn’t reappoint three senior department officials and a longtime department secretary at its board meeting last month.

At least a dozen members of the paid on-call department have resigned since Deputy Chief Pat Carter, Capt. Tom Ziolkowski, Lt. Jim Carter and secretary Katie Quinn Schneider had their posts rescinded.

Firefighter Tony Calzaretta said it’s generally a given that village employees, who are reappointed by the mayor on one-year contracts each spring, will be retained unless they’ve engaged in some sort of misconduct. In instances where the village does rescind someone’s employment, it typically provides an explanation. That, however, did not happen in this case, he said.

The moves coincided with the installation of Thomas J. Wendt as the new fire chief on Monday. Wendt, a part-time fire lieutenant in Calumet Park and the former chief of the Dixmoor Fire Department, replaced longtime Chief Leonard Edling, who retired at the end of April.

Considered an outsider by longtime members of the department, Wendt joined the Merrionette Park Fire Department a couple months ago, around the time Edling announced he would be stepping down.

While firefighters believed from the beginning that Wendt had the inside track to replace Edling and had not been opposed to his appointment, it was still shocking that three of the department’s senior officials were let go without explanation around the time he was installed.

Village spokesman Pete DiCianni said he could not comment on why the senior department members had not been retained because it was a personnel matter. He said the mayor chose Wendt as the new chief because of his vast amount of leadership experience and the fact that he lived in Merrionette Park.

In a statement released Tuesday, Mayor Dennis Magee said the village was thankful to outgoing members of our fire protection community for their service, but did not otherwise acknowledge the resignations. He characterized the fire department resignations as sour grapes and said that many of those who resigned did not regularly respond to calls anyway.

According to data provided by the village, eight of the 12 firefighters who resigned had responded to less than 10 percent of emergency incidents this year. Three had not responded to any and one responded to only 1 percent of calls.

To make up for the loss in manpower, Wendt said in a note to the mayor that he plans to present the names of seven new fire department applicants at the village board meeting in May. He also plans to restructure the department’s operations by staffing the firehouse with two members at all times to respond to minor incidents. Additional manpower can be summoned for larger incidents, as necessary.

Previously, the firehouse was unmanned, and firefighters responded to pages from dispatchers when emergency calls came in, a process Wendt called inefficient with the potential to prove costly, because dozens of firefighters might respond to a minor incident that did not require all of them.

Three years of budget documents show that Merrionette Park paid around $150,000 annually to its firefighters, not including a $40,500 salary for the chief.

thanks Dan

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Merrionette Park Fire Department news

Excerpts from ChicagoCBSlocal.com:

More than a dozen firefighters in the tiny suburb of Merrionette Park have resigned, or were not re-appointed, leaving the department at less than half-strength, but the fire chief said the department is not missing a beat.

Merrionette Park is less than a half-square-mile in area, and is served by a fire department whose firefighters are paid only when they’re called to duty. Merrionette Park firefighters are appointed on an annual basis to their paid on-call jobs.

Tony Calzaretta, vice president of the Merrionette Park Firefighters Association, said he and 13 other firefighters resigned after Fire Chief Tom Wendt replaced three longtime high-ranking officers – a deputy chief, a captain, and a lieutenant.

Wendt took over as head of the department after longtime Chief Len Edling retired at the end of April. He said the firefighters who resigned were not showing up for most calls anyway. He plans to appoint 10 new firefighters at the next village board meeting on May 17. In addition, starting next month, two firefighters will be stationed at the firehouse 24 hours a day.

Calzaretta said the new firefighters won’t have the knowledge or experience of those they will replace.

“What is going to happen is more of the experience that knows the town, that knows the rigs, that knows all this experience and knowledge is going to leave, and he’s going to replace it with outsiders and young people that have never worked in the fire service,” he said.

From the Merrionette Park Fire Fighters Association Facebook page:

The Merrionette Park Fire Fighters Association would like to take a moment to recognize the 17 (yes, seventeen) members that were not re-appointed by the village, or have resigned from service with the Department this week. These members have proven to be the backbone of the MPFD, with literally tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of combined hours serving this village. Whether it be answering the calls for Fires / EMS / Haz-Mat on a daily basis, or it be doing charity work throughout the area, or be it the countless hours of continuing training, or be it the countless hours of completely non-compensated time spent volunteering at the firehouse to provide some kind of coverage for the town, these members remained tried and true to the Merrionette Park Fire Department, truly giving it their all. Words cannot express the bond between these men and women. What they have gone through over the years is truly unbelievable. If you ask any firemen in the surrounding area what they think of where the MPFD was 10 years ago, to where it is now, I’m sure they’ll tell you its nothing short of amazing. These very men and women are the direct reason for that. We invite you to scroll some of these selected photos in this album from our facebook page to show you just a glimmer in the life’s of these members over the past several years. This is just the very tip of the iceberg of a combined 120 years of service spent together that will be leaving this village as of May 1, 2017. Listed below are the members and their years of service:

Katie Quinn Schneider- Dept. Secretary- 19 years of service (not reappointed)
Deputy Chief/EMT Pat Carter- 17 years of service (not reappointed)
Captain/Paramedic Tom Ziolkowski- 15 years of service (not reappointed)
Lt./EMT Jim Carter- 8 years of service(not reappointed)
Lt./Paramedic Tony Calzaretta – 7 years of service (resigned)
EMS Coordinator Shannon Ziolkowski- 8 years of service (resigned)
Engineer/Paramedic Kyle LaPorta- 6 years of service (resigned)
Engineer/Paramedic Joe LaPorta- 5 years of service (resigned)
FF/EMT Rick Whitlock- 6 years of service (resigned)
FF/Paramedic Mike Haas-6 years of service (resigned)
FF/Paramedic Jeff Goworowski- 4 years of service (resigned)
FF/Paramedic Scott Staal- 4 years of service (resigned)
FF/Paramedic Connor Hughes- 3 years of service (resigned)
FF/Paramedic Sean O’Connell-2 years of service (resigned)
FF/EMT Sean Devane- >1 year of service (resigned)
FF/EMT Mose Demasi- >1 year of service (resigned)
FF/EMT Chris Ibrahim>1 year of service (resigned)
*Lt. /Paramedic Joe Guarascio would make 18, as he has decided he will not be returning from his leave of absence- (7 years of service)

thanks Josh

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