Erial Volunteer Fire Company

Sunday, November 26, 2006

November 25, 2006

At the Gloucester Township Fire District #6 Board of Fire Commissioners meeting Nov. 16, 2006, a resolution was passed to change the provider of fire suppression within District #6 (Erial). The Board, by a vote of 3-1 (with 1 abstention), voted to utilize the Lambs Terrace Fire Company for fire protection services, effective the evening of Nov. 16. The Erial Volunteer Fire Company, which has been providing fire/rescue services to the district since 1948, was advised to no longer respond to the station. This letter will provide the events that have led to this change, and the immediate concerns I have as chief of the Erial Volunteer Fire Company for the well-being of Erial residents and firefighters.

This letter is being sent after one of our members spoke with State Coordinator-South Mike Gallagher.

On December 15, 2005, an Erial volunteer firefighter filed a complaint with the Board of Fire Commissioners at their regular monthly meeting involving safety concerns and other allegations against another volunteer firefighter. The Board’s decision was to separate the two individuals, and since they said there was not a logical way to separate two volunteers, the firefighter who had complaints against him was suspended pending the outcome of an investigation. Subsequently, the suspended firefighter resigned from the fire company, and a few days later, on Dec. 17, eight firefighters simultaneously submitted their resignations. The Board’s investigation was not continued since the firefighter left the company.

The Erial Volunteer Fire Company at that time had approximately 16 qualified firefighters, and the safety of the district was not at stake, especially with mutual aid being utilized.

In February 2006, newcomers George Brown, George Flinn, and Joyce Lane won an election for three seats on the Board of Fire Commissioners. Shortly thereafter, commissioner George Altman resigned and the remaining Board members appointed Steve Funkhouser.
It is public knowledge that Commissioner Brown is the father of two sons, and Commissioner Funkhouser the father of one son, who resigned from Erial in December 2005. Additionally, Commissioner Funkhouser is a career firefighter with Cherry Hill, Commissioner Flinn is a career firefighter at Lambs Terrace Fire Company, and Commissioner Lane is the mother of a career firefighter at Lambs. The fifth commissioner is Tom Eden, whose Board seat was not up for reelection in February 2006.

In order to protect our fire company and the community of Erial, our members voted on an agreement between the Erial Volunteer Fire Company and the Board. The agreement, in short, stated that Erial, so as long as it had seven members, would be the sole provider of fire suppression in the district. Both the Erial Volunteer Fire Company and the current Board members (including their solicitor) accepted this agreement in February 2006.

Since commissioners Brown, Flinn, Lane, and Funkhouser have joined the Board in March 2006, it has been increasingly difficult for our firefighters to respond and for me to perform my duties as chief. Below are a few changes that have been enacted in the past nine months:

• Commissioner Flinn has modified the fire response boxes with the Camden County Communications Center, adding Station 85 on all incidents (except EMS calls), and prohibiting myself from modifying any box. We have voiced concern over failing to use adjoining fire districts that are closer than Station 85, such as Blackwood and Winslow Twp.
• All volunteer applicants must pass a psychiatric exam
• Any applicant with previous firefighting experience but who has not been active in the past 3 years must register for Firefighter I (120+ hours of training)

In August 2006, the Board began “Operation 863”. This initiative allowed Lambs Terrace members that live in Erial (comprised mostly of Erial members that resigned in December 2005 that have since joined Lambs) to go to Station 86 and respond in an 86 apparatus (863), without any Erial volunteers on that apparatus. While I do not have statistics on how this initiative has worked, I do know that there were times when this engine did not respond due to insufficient manpower.

Finally, as stated above, on Nov. 16, the Board approved a resolution to have Lambs Terrace provide fire protection for Erial. Their reasoning was that the Erial volunteers have missed too many calls and have responded to calls with limited manpower. The Board has said that our company hasn’t responded to 63 out of 860 calls, responded to 127 calls with one engine, and 53 calls with three or less men. I have requested access to this data and my request has not been met and we requested data from Camden County Communications Center to execute our own analysis but were told that we would have to route our request thru the Board to the county.

The Board is manipulating the numbers to favor their argument. Without access to the data, I cannot provide a complete response; however, many of the calls require only a single engine response from our station (and in the case of EMS calls, our station is to always only respond with one engine), and I am not sure if the alleged 53 calls with three or less men includes the daytime response, in which the career personnel usually respond with 2, 3, or 4 men.

Additionally, it should be noted that our station is dispatched on all incidental calls in Lambs Terrace, even though their chief states that they have 40 members. I have requested that he remove us from all incidental calls but he did not reply. Members from both fire companies are taxed when the majority of the calls are incidental fire calls in which only one engine is really required (for example, adjacent communities Pine Hill and Blackwood run evening incidental calls without mutual aid).

Furthermore, Lambs Terrace has career personnel from 06:00 until 24:00, while our station has career personnel from 07:00 until 17:00; therefore, many calls are “recalled” by Lambs even before our station can respond, further driving up the number of calls in which we “don’t respond.”

Lambs Terrace Fire Company Chief Don Fisher stated at the Board meeting Nov. 16 that 11 of his volunteers would be assigned to respond to Station 86. Questions were asked of the Board relating to Lambs’ response rate and the qualifications of their firefighters – for example, what assured the Board that Lambs would respond more often than Erial has? The Board’s answer was that they could not be assured Lambs would in fact respond more often, or with more manpower – this change is only a six-month trial, they said. The Board also refused to give the names and addresses of the 11 volunteers, or even the experience that those volunteers had.

The Erial volunteers, under this resolution, would not be permitted to respond to calls. Immediately following the Board meeting, some of the Erial volunteers approached Chief Fisher and expressed their interest in still responding to calls and protecting the town. Chief Fisher said that he had no problem if Erial volunteers still responded.

A few days later, however, a memo was sent to the Erial volunteers forbidding them from responding to calls effective Dec. 4 (attached, please note that the stationary is on District 5 letter head).

Therefore, our firefighters are being pressured and intimidated into joining Lambs Terrace Fire Company, which we believe will not only violate the contract we have with the Board, but also jeopardize our fire company and the residents of this district.

In the first week since this resolution has been passed, there have been several incidents that impact public safety. For 7 calls, an average of 4.7 qualified Erial firefighters responded (not including probationary members), while an average of 2 Lambs firefighters responded. Clearly, if we had not responded in the past week, 2 Lambs firefighters per call would not be acceptable.

Our members have also witnessed 2 calls in which a Lambs firefighter that is not a qualified driver operated Engine 863.

We know that this is a short period to measure, but if these events are any indication of the fire protection that will be provided, the situation will only be worse for the residents of Erial.
Additionally, for your records, I am attaching the list of qualified Erial firefighters that the Board has essentially locked out. In summary, we have 13 volunteer firefighters with varied years of experience, including 6 current firefighters that are qualified to drive and pump at least one engine.

We also have 7 probationary members that are slated to attend Firefighter I training at the Camden County Fire Training Academy in February 2007 (with anticipated graduation in June 2007).

In contrast, we have been advised that Lambs Terrace has only 2 qualified personnel to drive an apparatus out of Station 86.

The Board has said they expect us to “rebuild” during the next six months, but how are we supposed to rebuild when the Board does not work with us and has prohibited us from responding? The Board has not assisted us with recruitment; they have only created a hostile work environment with unreasonable requirements and policies.

At the Board’s request, I have held several meetings with Board members – meeting as often as weekly. Our members have also attended all mandatory drills, as facilitated by Career Captain and Training Officer Mike Breeze.

We have also met with Gloucester Township Mayor Cindy Rau-Hatton, in hopes of working with this Board, but the mayor obviously has no authority over the Board – only the state could help at this point.

We recognize that this is a very complex and dangerous situation. I plead that your office speak with the Board, conduct an investigation, and provide recommendations on how to improve these circumstances. As much as...

Full Story