Posts Tagged International Association of Firefighters Local 439

Elgin Fire Department news

Nov 17

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | 2 Comments

Elgin Fire Department union officials oppose a cut in overtime in 2018 but stopped short of saying they’d file a complaint.

The city’s proposed budget includes cutting department staffing from 34 from 32 firefighters per shift, a savings of $700,000. No one would be laid off.

Edward Hanson, vice president of International Association of Firefighters Local 439, said the issue is not the loss of overtime pay, but having fewer people on shift. “There definitely will not be enough people to do our job to the level we have done it,” he said.

The department operates on a high overtime model, meaning the city chooses to pay overtime rather than hire more firefighters — whose starting pay is $67,181.

The mayor said it’s appropriate to cut overtime to balance the $116.4 million general fund. The plan is to also use $876,000 from reserves, create a new gasoline tax, and increase sales and hotel/motel taxes.

The department would create two more jump companies. About 80 percent of calls are for ambulance service.

Hanson said firefighters have been overworked since the city decreased shift staffing from 36 to 34 people a few years ago, a decision supported by an arbitrator in 2015. He claimed that, as a result, there have been more injuries on the job, but couldn’t immediately produce data to that effect.

It was suggested that the department should consider taking on alarm monitoring for businesses, which one expert estimated at up to $450,000 in revenues. The city also could draw more money from reserves next year, he said. The proposed budget has $43.6 million in reserves at the end of 2018, or 38 percent of operations, above the city’s policy of 30 percent or more.

thanks Dan

Tags: Edward Hanson, Elgin Fire Department, International Association of Firefighters Local 439, proposed budget cuts to the Elgin Fire Department

Elgin Fire Department news

Jul 12

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | Comments off

Excerpts from the ChicagoTribune.com:

As Elgin firefighters have voted to ratify a new contract — with the City Council set to vote on approving the deal Wednesday — Fire Chief John Fahy announced his retirement Friday. Fahy said that he would be leaving to take a job with the Elgin Community College.

Lt. Vince Rychtanek, International Association of Firefighters Local 439 President, said the union and the city avoided arbitration in coming to an agreement on the new contract. The last contract expired in 2013, and the new one covers 2014 to 2017. Per recession-related concessions, the old contract had no annual salary increases. The one up for council consideration has 2.5 percent annual pay hikes built into it.

Rychtanek said there were no other major changes, but that firefighters now will be able to bid on the station at which they would like to work after 20 years of service — something not in the old deal.

Fahy said firefighter starting pay is about $68,000 per year. Fahy retires from a job that paid him about $168,000 a year, and will he heading to Elgin Community College to become senior director of academic programming and public safety at the new ECC Center for Emergency Services in Burlington. The post pays $85,000.

Assistant Chief Dave Schmidt will be acting chief from late August through early October, Fahy said, during what’s left of his vacation time with the city. In August, current Assistant City Manager Rick Kozal becomes Elgin’s manager and eventually will name Fahy’s replacement.

Fahy worked as a firefighter in Aurora for six months before coming to the Elgin department in February 1987. He was named chief in late 2010 and took the post in January 2011. As chief, he was most proud of the department recently receiving a rating by the Insurance Services Office that places it among the top 2 percent of fire departments in the nation.

During his tenure as chief, Fahy said the department has upgraded technology; doubled available paramedic service to the community with a paramedic-engine concept; started a community outreach program with each station adopting a social service agency to support; upgraded its fleet with the purchase of several ambulances, ladder trucks, and fire engines; remodeled several aging fire stations; and began a Fire Explorer unit for youths.

The department is close to marking 150 years, Fahy said, and he was its 16th chief.

thanks Dan

Tags: Assistant Chief Dave Schmidt, Elgin Fire Chief John Fahy, Elgin fire chief to retire, Elgin Fire Department, Elgin firefighters ratify new contract, International Association of Firefighters Local 439, Lieutenant Vince Rychtanek

Elgin Fire Department news

Mar 26

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Excerpts from the DailyHerald.com:

An Elgin Fire Department lieutenant was demoted and two others also were disciplined after an investigation revealed they took explicit photos and videos of themselves and exchanged them while on duty, city officials said.

Lt. Amanda Bruce was demoted to firefighter, while firefighters John Sardina and Eric McMahon lost their special assignments, as driver and mechanic respectively, in agreements reached Tuesday between the employees, the International Association of Firefighters Local 439 and the city of Elgin, the documents of which the Daily Herald obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request.

The three received 20-day suspensions, and the city can terminate them if they display similar conduct in the next three years, the agreements state.

While on duty at Elgin fire stations, Bruce and Sardina took sexually oriented photos and videos of themselves, and McMahon took sexually oriented photos of himself, according to a Feb. 17 investigative report by the city’s professional standards officer, also released via the FOIA.

All materials depict the firefighters alone. Sardina and McMahon sent their own images to Bruce, and she sent her images to Sardina and an unnamed boyfriend, the report states. The photos and videos are from 2009 through 2013.

Fire Chief John Fahy said the employees have fully taken responsibility for their actions. “They never denied it and wanted to make amends for the misconduct that happened on duty a few years back.”

The Daily Herald submitted its FOIA request March 10. City officials asked for a five-day extension that would have run out Thursday. The timing of the disciplinary settlement was unrelated to the FOIA request, Fahy said.

“This was in the pipeline,” he said. “The extension was to release a complete package, because we were in negotiations with the employees and we were coming to the conclusion with the discipline.”

The materials include videos of Bruce in a fire station’s women’s bathroom and photos in various states of undress, the report states. Bruce told city officials she was on duty when she used her cellphone to take the photos and videos, and sent them using her personal email.

Sardina’s photos include some taken in fire station bathrooms; the video depicts him in his fire station bunk. In one photo, Sardina is coming out of a fire station shower with a towel around his waist; Bruce told city officials she took the photo, the report states.

McMahon’s selfies include some taken in the bathroom of Elgin fire stations, the report states.

Fahy said the matter surfaced nearly two years ago when Elgin Fire Battalion Chief Terrence Bruce reported to an assistant chief his then-wife Amanda had engaged in misconduct involving Sardina and McMahon, Fahy said.

The city asked Terry Bruce to bring in evidence of the allegations but then realized he couldn’t be compelled to do that and returned the evidence to him, City Manager Sean Stegall said.

The city obtained the evidence a few months later, after Amanda Bruce told Elgin police her then-husband “had gained unauthorized and possibly illegal access to certain personal information” including videos and photos. She made a police report in October 2014 saying Terry Bruce gave the materials to an attorney who served as a guardian ad litem for their children in divorce proceedings, the report states.

Elgin police obtained a copy of the materials from the attorney and conducted a criminal investigation that ended in April 2015, when the Kane County state’s attorney’s office determined criminal charges would not be pursued.

An administrative investigation was launched in May 2015 to find out if any of the misconduct took place while on duty. The lengthy process involved hiring a company to extract time and date stamps from the photos and videos, and comparing those to staffing records, Fahy said. “We were not in a hurry. We wanted to get this right.”

Fahy said he initially wanted to fire the three employees for the on-duty misconduct but changed his mind.

“These are three good employees with stellar records, and they had a bad day,” he said. “My decision to discipline them instead of termination is appropriate.”