Accepting a $2.3 million grant from the federal government to
hire firefighters may sound like a no brainer, but the Gilroy City
Council wants to know what strings are attached before giving it
their approval.
Accepting a $2.3 million grant from the federal government to hire firefighters may sound like a no brainer, but the Gilroy City Council wants to know what strings are attached before giving it their approval.
Awarded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the grant will fund six firefighter positions for two years. But after the money is spent, the city is on its own if they want to keep the firefighters on staff, said City Administrator Tom Haglund. That reality complicates the council’s decision, city council members said.
Options include rejecting the grant outright, using the money to hire firefighters with the knowledge that they will only serve for two years or hiring them with the hopes that the city will be able to identify additional revenue streams to keep them employed once the grant money is gone.
The Council will review details at an October meeting, but early reactions were mixed.
“It’s an opportunity for us to hire more firefighters for at least two years until the economy recovers,” said Councilman Craig Gartman who is not running for re-election in November.
Others looked at the grant as a way to end overtime costs. The city paid firefighters $923,000 in overtime in 2009, according to city documents.
Not only does overtime put a strain on the city’s finances, it overtaxes firefighters physically, Gartman said.
“You start taxing people that much and you run into issues of their own safety and the community’s safety when (firefighters) are tired and overworked,” he said, adding that the grant will give the city “some breathing room.”
Gartman said he hoped the city could identify another revenue stream by the time the grant funding runs out to keep some, if not all, the new hires on board.
If not, “we need to make sure people know that this is a two-year program,” he said. “The union has to understand that.”
Jim Buessing, secretary and treasurer of Gilroy Fire Fighters Local 2805, said his colleagues advocated for the grant from the time the city applied in January. The fire department let go of six firefighters the previous year due to budget cuts and has been stretched thin ever since, he said. The most recent round of grant money is even more attractive because it has fewer strings attached than in previous years, when departments had to provide a funding match or promise to keep the positions around after the grant money ran out.
“This grant is a big deal,” Buessing said. “We’re one of the few departments that received this grant. Any opportunity to get free funds to add more firefighters on duty is a great thing for any fire department.”
Gilroy’s grant is the largest award in the Bay Area.
Councilwoman Cat Tucker said she wants to hear more information before casting her vote, but agreed that Gilroy can use all the money it can get.
“Why would we turn money down?” she said.
In the current economy, unemployed firefighters, like the 49 that were recently laid off in San Jose, “would jump at the chance” to secure a job, even if it was only guaranteed for two years, Gartman said.
But after two years, “we’ll be right back in the soup as to how we pay them,” said Councilman Perry Woodward. “I’m not comfortable with that. I wouldn’t rule it out but it’s always disruptive and painful to let people go, even if they have only been there for two years. I have concerns about the caliber of applicants we would get under that scenario.”
The council directed the fire administration to apply for the grant when the fire department was short staffed and the city was forced to close the Sunrise Fire Station down several days a month, Councilman Dion Bracco said. A new contract agreement forged between the city and firefighters reduced the number of men on an engine from four to three, allowing the department to reopen Sunrise. The way Bracco sees it, the department is fully staffed, he said.
The council will have to weigh the costs associated with keeping six firefighters on the payroll with the overtime costs, Bracco said. Last year’s figures show that those numbers are about the same. Bracco wasn’t as optimistic as some of his colleagues that the economy would turn around in time to maintain the positions.
“There’s no way we could continue paying them,” he said. “This will be our new normal for quite some time. Just because the government is going to give you $2 million doesn’t mean you should take it.”
