||| FROM PATRICK SHEPLER |||
How, in good conscience, can the Board of Fire Commissioners approve another new Admin. position, while simultaneously threatening layoffs of the most tenured actual responders? And how can they add another position while threatening layoffs with the Union’s blessings and support?
Pay and benefits could easily add another annual $150.000 to their self-induced budget crisis.
The announcement of the new Assistant Chief job is posted somewhere on the OIFR website, and also posted in the Washington Daily Dispatch, under their Jobs Section:
The applications are due by September 18th.
The same day as the next Commission meeting.
This suspiciously short application period could be for a number of reasons, but the Top Two come to mind.
Number Two:
The Commissioners don’t want to give external applicants time to research what a financial risk they’d be taking, given no chance of the same, recently crushed, levy passing in November.
Number One:
The Chief and Commission have already made their choice for the new Assistant Chief.
Reccomendation to OIFR Local 3911 Union President:
Mr. Weibling,
I suggest you demand Impact Bargaining because these proposed changes would affect: “Wages, Hours, Terms, and Conditions of Employment”.
It would be a nice touch to send PERC (Public Employees Relations Commission) a friendly heads-up, that you’ll be spending some time with them soon. After your initial demands for bargaining (for your members) fall on the deaf or addled ears of the Commissioners.
Thank you, Patrick Shepler, for keeping your eyes on what’s happening in OIFR and catching what most people probably missed; I did. I’m surprised to see no comments yet so I’ll start.
Will people fall for being extorted to vote for that same failure of a levy, now that the financial squeeze is on even further and the union is not standing by its own long-tenured (local) responders who they say will be laid off – ie sacrificed or used as some sort of ransom – IF we don’t vote to pass the levy this time? Such perfect timing for an expensive hire on top of all this financial mess! I hope people will see this for what it is.
An Ad-nauseum fact: Commissions and boards have all the power – especially when the people go to sleep and stop showing up and asking questions. Something’s not right; many eyes should be on this. Once appointees have a quorum, the citizens and any staff under these types of governing body are powerless. This must not keep happening. Elections matter. The damage is already done, and this feels like the final insult before Nov. elections to the community, our long-term local responders, and to the incoming commission in 2024.
Please excuse the bad yet appropriate pun, given in a conversation with someone when I wondered why there were no comments to your letter. this person thought that ‘people feel burned.’ How apt, at least for me. ” Insanity Is Doing the Same Thing Over and Over Again and Expecting Different Results.”