Board of Aldermen Page 8
May 10, 2016
and our firemen need to be trained to put out those fires as well as to do with house fires with a variety of
building issues. | think we need to think about the quality of firefighting we need in this city to provide the
safety that our residents deserve.
Alderman Dowd
In past sometimes when contracts came up the question was asked to the Commission and the chief, is this
the way you want to spend your money. Well, the money for the FY ’16 portion of this is already in the budget,
the money to cover this in the FY ’17 budget are in the firemen’s budget which is in the budget that we
received tonight and it’s under the spending cap. | think that with an overall percentage of 1.7% that’s really
good. | can only remember one other time that a bargaining unit took a 0% in a year. They are doing this
because they understand FY °17 is a challenge for us. | am going to be supporting this.
Alderman Schoneman
FY ’17 is certainly a difficult year; FY °18 and FY ’19 are likely to be too. | didn’t support this in the Budget
Review Committee and | don’t feel | can here either. | am fearful that if we continue to expand salaries...| think
to make this increase with the knowledge that future years will be perhaps even more difficult than this one; |
cannot do it at this time.
Alderman Lopez
| just wanted to say that | am keenly aware of how important the fire department is; particularly in my work. We
have had a lot of fires and emergency response situations and | think generalizing and saying that we need to
be consistent across all facets of our city is a mistake because this is the fire department. It’s the same
argument that | felt strongly about with the police department. This is the time to start cutting costs in the
leadership and the training of an important and essential service. We do have the heroin and opioid crisis but
we also have a lot of aging buildings, especially in my Ward. | know that everyone who voted for me and is a
constituent in Ward 4 appreciates that the fire department shows up prepared with the equipment they need. |
am in support of this because | want to make sure we have a necessary and important service in our city and |
don’t want to reduce that in any way.
Alderman Dowd
| have been involved with budgets in the city for over 33 years and | haven’t seen one year where someone
came in and said this is a great year, we can spend what we want. Every year has been a challenge.
A Viva Voce Roll Call was taken, which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman Wilshire, Alderman Clemons, Alderman Dowd, 8
Alderman Caron, Alderwoman Melizzi-Golja, Alderman Moriarty
Alderman Lopez, Alderman McCarthy
Nay: Alderman Deane, Alderman Cookson, Alderman Siegel, 6
Alderman Schoneman, Alderman McGuinness, Alderman LeBrun,
Recusal: Alderman O’Brien 1
MOTION CARRIED
Resolution R-16-026 declared duly adopted.
