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Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Jersey City firefighters union president: Understaffing puts residents and JCFD members in danger
By Amy Sara Clark/The Jersey Journal February 07, 2010, 6:23PM David Jolkovski/The Jersey Journal Joseph Krajnik, president of Local 1066 of the firefighters union, talks about the understaffing of the Jersey City Fire Department. The Jersey City Fire Department is so badly understaffed that firefighter and civilian safety will suffer, according to the firefighters' union. "You can't just cut if you're down to the bone," Joseph Krajnik, president of Local 1066 Firefighters Union president told The Jersey Journal during a meeting last week. "Something's going to happen and it's probably going to be (cost) the life of a firefighter." In the 1980s, Jersey City had 564 firefighters -- today it has 380. On Jan. 14, Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy announced that the city has reduced the number of fire companies from 26 to 22 and cut the city's arson unit from 13 people to two because there aren't enough firefighters to go around. City officials agree that staffing levels are low, but say they're not so low to be dangerous. "Of course we would like to have the maximum manpower, but in view of the current economic downturn, our taxpayers simply cannot afford such a burden," Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy said in a written statement. "However, we are doing more with less and have shifted our resources to strategic areas -- three of them being rather recently constructed firehouses." Krajnik and Fire Chief Michael O'Reilly agree the staffing problems are not due to having too many officers in the department. Over the past few years, retiring officers have for the most part not been replaced. As of March 1 there will only be 135 fire captains, 21 battalion chiefs and six deputy chiefs, according to O'Reilly. They also both agree with studies that say a municipality needs an average of 5.4 firefighters per fire company, per shift to be effective. But even with only 22 companies operating, the JCFD currently staffed at an average of 4.3 firefighters per shift. The cutbacks mean there's not enough firefighters to cover sick days and vacations; so far the city has spent $2.8 million in firefighter overtime out of $4 million it has budgeted for the fiscal year ending June 30, according to both Krajnik and O'Reilly. But like Healy, the fire chief denies that the cutbacks will endanger the safety of either firefighters or the public. "Are we short staffed? Absolutely," O'Reilly said. "Should the public be concerned about fire safety? No. As of right now I don't foresee any public safety problems because we can still maintain our response time of three-to-five minutes." He added that he believes Krajnik's decision to take his concerns to The Jersey Journal is an effort to try to manipulate public opinion during contract negotiations. The firefighters' contract expired in December of 2008. Krajnik, however, denied the charge, saying he was bringing the issue to the media because he was concerned about safety. "The problem we have is that people who don't want to make the hard decisions ... nobody's listening," he said.
Posted on: 2/8 8:10
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Just can't stay away
 
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"Only 135 fire captains...6 chiefs." Only? That's 162 Brass to the 380 firefighters. 2:1, FF:Brass. A little top heavy. Most fire departments have a 5:1 ratio. How about moving some of the Brass to the front line and stop wasting money.
Posted on: 2/8 8:33
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Unions are one of the biggest wastes in this area.
Posted on: 2/8 11:36
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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"...over the past few years retiring officers have for the most part not been replaced." These are the same kind of vague, unsubstantiated "common sense" types of statements I hear Sottolano and Brennan making at council meetings. Fact: eighteen people were promoted to captain in 2008. A fifteen percent increase in captains.
They probably do think they are focused on downsizing the brass but there seems to be a disconnect in that thinking when they need to make a sweeping patronage-based promotion because somebody's neighbor's kid only scored 18th on the exam, as though that doesn't count somehow.
Posted on: 2/8 11:55
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Quite a regular
 
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It's the Oprah of FD's: "everybody retires a captain!!" A gift that gives far more than new car. This is where our taxes go, to municipal jobs programs and their generous pensions. The majority of unionized labor in this country now works for the government, the rest of us will never see benefits like that.
Most cities need far fewer firemen that they did decades ago because building codes, along with safer more efficient appliances, have created far fewer building fires.
Posted on: 2/8 12:41
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Whatever happened to the rank of Lieutenant? It seems that FFs go straight to Captain and a huge salary increase. These guys should be taken care of but only for time and quality of service not patronage.
Posted on: 2/8 14:30
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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unions are sucking this country dry. there was a time and a place for them. that time is gone.
Posted on: 2/8 15:34
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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+1 They are at the heart of the problem of municipal finances.
Posted on: 2/8 15:41
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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+10. the few guys i know in unions laugh at me (and the rest of us). mandatory 15 minute breaks every hour. work days that are basically half days to the rest of us.
i remember years ago working at javits center, and you were not allowed to put in a plug to turn on a light in your booth. you had to get on the list to have a union guy come and do it for you. every time, you'd wait for 5 hours, go back to try and find someone, and all the union dudes would be back there drinking and hanging out... useless!
Posted on: 2/8 16:13
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I worked at the Javits Center as a carpenter back in the day, and this is very true. I was at a booth where an exhibitor needed to plug some lighting in. We told him we couldn't do it, since we were not electricians, and it made me feel real stupid. He looked at us like we were kidding and proceeded to plug it in himself. A group of angry electricians popped up like hornets within seconds. They actually wound up firing everyone at the Javits Center and made them reapply to weed out those who had criminal backgrounds. Being a carpenter was the only time in my working life that I was ever told to slow down because I was working too fast.
Posted on: 2/8 16:33
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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ha ha ha - Crazy, i think you may have "helped" me! the same thing happened to me....
and the weird thing is... the electricians would be gone for hours, but the moment you turned on a light bulb, they'd start bullying you!
Posted on: 2/8 16:57
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Not too shy to talk
 
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I believe the union, I guess I am considered to be a communist for that........
Posted on: 2/8 20:52
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Quite a regular
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Make that past tense as far as private industry. They rode the auto industry into the ground with elaborate contracts. Anytime a labor negotiator says one of his goals is to "protect jobs" you can sell that industry short. UAW crushed the Saturn experiment as heresy, and got the cooperation of the calcified GM management in doing it. The big question is why do we tolerate in government what has not worked out in industry? These "workers" game the contract cycle to get the city administrations to do whatever they want in exchange for electoral support.
Posted on: 2/8 23:16
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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The demise of the auto industry is much, much more complicated than "the union killed it." Much.
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Posted on: 2/9 8:09
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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T-bird - it may be more complicated than that (like poorly built cars, by union guys no less), but when you look at the amount of $$ from each American car sold that goes to retirement/pension/health care of anyone that ever worked building cars... it's disgusting.
the final piece of info that blew it for me was that in (some/most?) plants in Detroit, if you work on the line for 6 months, you get health insurance for life. are you kidding me?!
Posted on: 2/9 10:10
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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No, you're not a communist, you just believe some people should be grossly overpaid and hired based on connections. Think of unions as the retail version of corporate executives. That might help the visual.
Posted on: 2/9 10:26
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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The Jersey City Fire Department operates with 4 battalion chiefs, 1 safety battalion chief and i deputy chief for the 24 hour shift. Which leaves 1 extra battalion chief and 2 extra deputy chief to cover all vacation and sick time. Four captains are assigned to all 27 companies in the city. That means there are 108 captains assigned. Captains run the firehouse and the company. Captains are also interior firefighters. They pull hose, operate the nozzle, search, rescue, ladder, vent, etc.... They do everything a firefighter does, with the exception that they have to watch over the safety of the firefighter's in there company. The Jersey City Fire Department is understaffed at the firefighter position.
Posted on: 2/9 10:41
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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As someone who grew up in a small town with a volunteer fire department, It's sometimes hard to wrap my head around how much urban fire fighters are paid. $100,000 is not uncommon for a ff salary in JC.
I guess this all comes down to economics. We have decided asa city to afford ourselves a quality fire force. I'm assuming quality is defined as expertise, equipment, and personal for the cost. If one of those three factors increases, we should be able to decrease another portion; thus, an increase is expertise should mean that we can decrease employees. For the cost the city is willing to pay, expertise has increased (the longer on the force, the more you are paid). That means we have a huge number of elite fire fighters, so theoretically we could decrease employees and maintain quality. I guess that the justification for a reduction, we should be able to maintain quality.
Posted on: 2/9 10:43
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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From the civilian perspective, with limited understanding of what is "necessary" and what isn't, so I looked at Philadelphia for guidance. It is a northeastern city with a similar cost of living and provides a lot of detail in its budget which makes a comparison to Jersey City possible.
So, here is how Philadelphia staffs its fire department: They have: 1,338 firefighters who make between $40k and $56k 267 lieutenants; $60k to $64k 92 captains; 69k to $72k 48 battalion chiefs; $80k to $84k 8 deputy chiefs; $91k to $96k 1 special operations chief; $80k to $84k 1 executive chief; $108k The 2010 budget for overtime and unused holiday pay is just under $18 million. All-in expenses for uniformed personnel (all of the people above) is $135 million. Philadelphia has a population of 1,540,000 and covers an area of 135 square miles. (One uniformed fireman per 878 people or 12.9 per square mile.) Jersey City has (as of YE 2008): 406 firefighters 150 captains (no lieutenants) 23 battalion chiefs 10 deputy chiefs 1 fire apparatus chief 1 Chief Jersey city has a population of 242,000 and covers 14.9 square miles. (One uniformed fireman per 409 people or 39.7 per square mile.) Unfortunately, JC doesn't provide the level of transparency in its budgeting process that other cities do, so we don't know the range of salaries is for any of them, but we do know that the budget for all salaries and wages in the fire department is $66.3 million and total headcount for the department was 670 as of YE 2008. Since wages are budgeted to be up slightly for the current budget year, I'm guessing head count is about the same. That means the average salary/wage for the entire fire department (including dispatchers) is $99,000 and change. In Philadelphia, one person (the chief) made more than $100k before overtime.
Posted on: 2/9 21:32
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Thank you for posting T-Bird. Transparency is exactly what is needed and given the internet the city should be able to accomplish it in an efficient, cost effective manner.
Posted on: 2/9 22:18
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Fortunately, the Star Ledger provides it. Jersey City Fire Department payroll. Click on the orange box on the right to look it up. http://www.starledger.com/str/indexpage/payrolls/active.asp
Posted on: 2/9 22:29
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Whoa - thanks West! What a motherlode.
Huh - 179 firefighters have salaries of $100k or more compared to one in Philadelphia (the chief.)
Posted on: 2/9 23:02
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Quite a regular
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You seem well informed, we've now heard about philly, any idea how JCFD stacks up against other similar cities in terms of companies per capita or square mile? NYC, with 32 times our population, and a higher density, has 221 companies (houses presuming they are the same as companies), That would equal 7 companies for JC. With 11,400 firemen/32 equaling 356, it sounds like we might have the right number of firemen, just too many companies requiring too many apparently overpaid brass. Thus the move to reduce companies is actually too little.
Posted on: 2/9 23:27
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Holy sh*t. The number of people making more than $100,000 is absolutely obscene. Look at the general Jersey City payroll. Does that include the police? Now we know why the city has no money.
Posted on: 2/9 23:59
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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The general public has no idea how a fire department operates. The fire department need's to get out and educate the citizens on how a fire department needs to be run efficiently.
***Most Fire Departments operate in the State of New Jersey with a 3-1 ratio meaning firefighters to officers. The reasoning is most fire companies have 2 or 3 or 4 members on the rig. If the equipment was staffed correctly there would be a higher ratio of firefighters.
Posted on: 2/10 0:54
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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I've been upfront about the fact that I don't have much of a clue about how to operate a fire department. I do, however, understand how to look at data. You very well may be right that the ration should be higher, but that can be achieved in a way other than increasing the numerator (hiring more firefighters.) What if you decreased the denominator? My primary points were, from a layman's perspective: - perhaps the overall fire department (not the number of actual firefighters, per se) is overstaffed. - the personnel of the fire department appears to be overpaid. By a lot. And even if we adjust personnel to achieve desired ratios - the next question should be: do we have too many companies?
Posted on: 2/10 9:40
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Excellent analysis. Can present this at the next Council meeting, tonight maybe?
Posted on: 2/10 9:54
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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Not too shy to talk
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A former Chief of the Fire Dept. just left and received a payout for unused sick and vacation of over $300,000 !!!
No wonder this City is broke !!!
Posted on: 2/10 10:14
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That sick days and vacation days for public employees should be "use-it-or-lose-it" should be a no-brainer. That's the way most of the rest of the world operates.
Posted on: 2/10 10:25
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Re: Will fire department cutbacks threaten public safety? Union says yes; city says no |
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My primary points were, from a layman's perspective: - perhaps the overall fire department (not the number of actual firefighters, per se) is overstaffed. - the personnel of the fire department appears to be overpaid. By a lot. And even if we adjust personnel to achieve desired ratios - the next question should be: do we have too many companies? 1st point- The JCFD has the same ratio as most fire departments in Essex and Hudson County. 2nd point- They are paid the same as most firefighters in the state of New Jersey. ***This is not a Jersey City issue.. It is a state of New Jersey issue.. Not one fire department in New Jersey meets NFPA 1710.
Posted on: 2/10 12:30
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What is NFPA 1710? You are probably right in that excessive wages are a NJ-wide issue - but I don't think that automatically makes it a "state" issue. We have local dominion over the fire department and its purse. Fixing that problem needs to start somewhere - why not here and now? The fact that other Hudson and Essex departments are equally bloated with unnecessary management does not come as a surprise to me.
Posted on: 2/10 13:01
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