Clifton Journal- Showing signs of support
4-3-09
Clifton residents are posting signs on their lawns urging Clifton’s City Council to re-open Fire Station 2.
CLIFTON – Losing 16 firefighters has created a ripple effect within the City’s Fire Department, starting with slower response times in emergencies to shutting down a firehouse and to providing mutual aid to other municipalities, say fire officials, who also claim the department is now operating below national standards.
As of Wednesday morning, Clifton Journal’s press time, the sign at Fire Station 2 on Dumont Avenue still read “Sorry We’re Closed.”
The City locked up the Albion section firehouse on March 7 after budget cuts forced the City Council to lay off 12 firefighters, eliminate a deputy chief position, and not fill empty posts due to retirements in the Fire Department. The Council made the cuts as part of a City-wide layoff plan to save $4 million in the 2009 budget in order to meet a State-imposed tax levy cap law.
After shutting the firehouse, the City is left with five stations to cover an 11-square-mile area. Fire officials said they will have to adjust to the personnel changes, but caution the response time, the time a fire company is dispatched to the time they arrive on scene, could increase beyond the national standard of 4 minutes with the shortage of manpower.
Since the cuts were made, Clifton Fire Deputy Chief George Spies said he anticipated response time would exceed 4 minutes. The reason, he said, is the distance other fire engines will have to travel to cover a larger area.
Spies said the Department is also running with the minimum number of crew needed on each engine, short of the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) guideline for meeting response time. The NFPA recommends a minimum of four firefighters per engine company and 4 minutes of travel time for the first responding company to a fire. The document is based on a fire in a typical single family, two-story 2,000-square-foot house.
“We’re running at bare minimum right now. The NFPA standard is a minimum of 4 people. Now it’s 3,” Spies said.
Bob DeLuca, head of the Clifton Firemen’s Mutual Benevolent Association, said the FMBA has also filed a grievance with the City because the number of firefighters on duty at one time falls under the NFPA recommended staffing number of 27.
Since Fire Station 2 closed, Spies said he recorded response times up to 7 minutes for Engine 6, the company now covering for the closed fire station. Since Fire Station 2 was closed, Spies said, four firefighters have been hospitalized for over-exertion and strain.
One call can need as many as three pieces of equipment, Spies explained, adding firefighters responded to 14 calls between midnight and noon on Monday, a day he described as “unusually busy.” Half of the 14 calls were for medical emergencies, while the rest included everything from a gas leak to a power failure causing people to be trapped in an elevator at the Daughters of Miriam senior center on Hazel Street. Spies said he had to utilize men from three of the City’s five working fire stations to answer the Daughters of Miriam call that morning.
“Everything was committed and that was a simple power failure,” he said.
Surrounding municipalities have also been impacted by the closing of the Dumont Avenue station. The engine company provided mutual aid to Paterson, Montclair and Passaic.
“It’s had a negative impact on the surrounding communities because we rely on mutual aid anytime we have a fire. It’s certainly impacted Clifton’s ability to hold up their agreement with Passaic County mutual aid,” said Passaic Fire Chief Patrick Trentacost. “Not to the fault of the Clifton Fire Department, but I don’t think that was ever considered.”
Trentacost said Passaic’s four engines and two ladder companies are strictly limited to fire suppression and rescue and do not make Emergency Medical Service (EMS) runs, unlike the Clifton firefighters, who are also trained as emergency medical technicians. Clifton is “our number one mutual aid company for EMS,” Trentacost said.
“It’s a concern now with that they are even able to respond to our EMS calls, now because of the layoffs,” he said.
In turn, if Clifton’s two ambulances are busy and the City requires additional aid from Passaic, response time can be between 15-20 minutes because the call must go through a series of dispatch centers first, he said.
“We have been fortunate enough to accommodate” mutual aid requests, Trentacost said. “There is never a guarantee. We would always try to help each other out, but there is never a guarantee. The only guarantee is what you have in your own town. Mutual aid is exactly what it is: It’s to aid another town in their time of need. It’s not to supplement services,” Trentacost said.
He stressed that communication with Clifton was critical. “We have a long standing relationship. We do speak with them on a daily basis,” he said.
Spies said Engine 4 on Main Avenue in the Delawanna section, already a mutual aid company for Passaic, is now sapped with additional requests for assistance from Paterson and Montclair. Spies said he can’t promise Clifton would be able to answer those requests.
Earlier this week, the Clifton FMBA Local 21 handed out more than 500 lawn signs that read “I Vote to Reopen Engine 2,” to residents and businesses across the City.
Renee Kymack of Dumont Avenue had two displayed in front of her home. Knowing that the fire station down the block was no longer operating is a fact Kymack and other residents in the neighborhood said they are still getting used to.
“It’s scary,” said Kymack. “For me, it just feels like there is something missing in the neighborhood.”
Larry Greco, who lives on the corner of Frederick Avenue and Valley Road, said he knew it might take longer for an emergency crew to reach his home, now that Engine 2 was out of commission.
“It’s going to take a while. Five minutes or more? I don’t know,” said Greco. “There is no question it’s going to be a substantial amount of time to get from Van Houten Avenue or Broad Street,” he said referring to Fire Station 6.
Fire Station 2 was the first responder for an area that includes at least five schools, several small businesses and large industries. The Daughters of Miriam senior care facility and Gallen Institute on Hazel Street also fell under the station’s watch. The Center includes 290 beds for its skilled nursing facility, apartments for 300 people in addition to a medical program and outpatient workshop it runs for people with development disabilities.
Daughters of Miriam Executive Director Fred Feinstein said the campus makes “regular usage of the City’s emergency services.”
“On a daily basis, we use them once a day. That may not be every day. Some days we use them two or three times during the day,” Feinstein said. “We are concerned about any cutbacks in the services. On the other hand we understand the problems the municipality faces. My hope is the State, in cooperation with the stimulus package, can restore some of these funds.”
The Council asked the City’s five bargaining units, including the FMBA, to forgo contractual raises this year in order to prevent the job losses and keep the Fire Station 2 open. The FMBA proposed working two weeks without salary to save $675,000 in the budget but the Council rejected multiple offers from the union that asked for a contract extension with the promise of no future layoffs. City officials said they were hoping to work out a deal after the union submitted another offer last week.
In its efforts to save the $4 million from the budget, the City Council cut a total of 41 positions including those in the Fire Department.
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