Board of Aldermen 05-11-2021 Page 36
including overtime pension costs and that did not come out of the City and there’s data available for that. Some
of it is from grants. So | think that the overtime costs that we are talking about via the pandemic is not a hit on
the City per se as far as the Budget is concerned. So just all | wanted to say.
Alderman O’Brien
Thank you. | wasn’t going to say much. | can appreciate Alderman Lu’s concern but like Alderman Dowd said,
in my 35 year career on the Fire Department, today’s requirement to be a firefighter is a minimum you have to
be an EMT. Some are even paramedics which basically is advanced medical and everything. But whether
they are sitting there doing it, directing traffic or just breathing, | think some people lost sight of why they are
there. And because a certain drug which is the vaccine is being administered to the person. Some people who
may not know, can have an allergic reaction. Now out of the major forms of shock, one of the ones that is very
dangerous is anaphylactic shock. Basically what ends up, and now | am reverting back to my EMT days, but
basically your airway constricts is one of the symptoms and you cannot breathe and that is why the firefighters
are there.
Fortunately it is a rare event, but it does happen. And when you have nurses that are going out because of the
thousands of people that they inoculated, giving the shots in the arms, the firefighters were there mostly just to
make sure if anybody was feeling ill or showing signs of shock. So fortunately it wasn’t anything major that |
am aware of but that question can be referred to the Fire Chief. But their job was highly skilled. After sitting
there and taking medical courses for 35 years, it is a very complete skill set. People rely on it. | have had
people wrap their human bodies around trees and | think they were very appreciative of my skill set in trying to
extricate them from vehicles. And so the firefighters | think they did a great job there in assisting the public,
and again, it was predominantly a cautionary measure. So | was glad that they were there. And like Alderman
Dowd says, it was covered with the Federal dollars that was granted with the inoculations so there wasn’t too
much of a municipal impact. And those that followed within the Finance and the Budget Committee saw that
because we did a vote to approve that and the money went back to the Fire Department if you remember that
was | think Assistant Chief Buxton came to that very same meeting speaking to have that money
compensated. That was the reason that he gave. So again that’s the reasoning. So thank you, Madam
President.
President Wilshire
You’re welcome. Alderman Lopez and then Alderwoman Lu.
Alderman Lopez
Yeah | just wanted to add that the firefighters are kind of, you don’t want them to have to prove their worth
because that means there is a fire. Equally you don’t want them to have to respond to an emergency and look
busy, but they are the ones who are likely to transport somebody in need of healthcare or experiencing a
medical emergency to the hospital and it is only prudent that we have them on hand. So! appreciate their
presence and | think we do have a lot of Fiscal Priorities to be looking at coming up and | mean some of that
may be a tough decision but | would much rather look at trying to cut how often we are watering the plants or
how often we are buffing eagle than how often we have firefighters available to respond to an emergency.
Thank you.
President Wilshire
Alderwoman Lu?
Alderwoman Lu
Thank you. | just wanted to clarify or point out that any time you manage a pension system, you really don’t
know if you are level funding it. So the Federal Government is paying what they typically put forward per hour
of work toward their pension, | understand that. But there’s always a large risk that the management of those
