MANSFIELD — A divided Mansfield City Council chose Tuesday evening to delay a vote that would create a fourth assistant chief position in the fire department.
The 4-2 vote came after a 40-minute-plus public discussion on the request to create a now position that would focus solely on the MFD’s growing emergency medical services and requirements related to those services.
Voting to delay the decision until Nov. 15 were 2nd Ward Councilwoman Cheryl Meier, 3rd Ward Councilman Rev. El Akuchie, 4th Ward Councilman Alomar Davenport and At-large Councilman Phil Scott.
5th Ward Councilman Aurelio Diaz and At-large Councilwoman Stephanie Zader voted to push ahead with a vote on the proposal.
1st Ward Councilwoman Laura Burns didn’t attend the meeting. 6th Ward Councilwoman Kimberly Moton attended the session via Zoom, but could not vote on any legislation.
No council member spoke against the proposal. But some expressed a desire to allow time for public feedback after MFD Chief Steve Strickling provided details during public session regarding the need for the position.
When council first discussed a potential new slot Oct. 18, it was done during a closed-door, executive session with Assistant Chief Dan Crow and Human Resources Director Sharon May.
On Tuesday during public session, Strickling provided a point-by-point need for the position, saying his No. 1 priority is providing a “top-notch service” to city residents.
He also told council the new assistant chief slot would allow for “strategic” planning for EMS, rather than focused on the daily tactics needed for calls.
The chief then told council that the city will hit 12,000 calls for service in 2022, a one-year record.
“10,200 of those calls, or 85 percent, are related to EMS. It’s a huge portion of our business,” Strickling said. “Having one of our assistant chiefs, our platoon chiefs, work on that on a part-time basis — on something that’s 85 percent of what we do — is just not working out for various reasons.”
Strickling also said EMS is a “very high-risk portion of what we do in our job.”
“And by high risk, I mean, there’s very complicated medical protocols. They’re not easy. They’re very, very complicated. I think our drug license contains about 80 drugs that we are authorized to be able to use to help people in a medical emergency,” said the chief, also a licensed physician’s assistant.
Strickling said the complicated protocols and their implementation, along with training and continuing education of personnel, creates a medical/legal aspect for the city to consider.
“We need to make sure that we don’t put the city at risk for litigation. It’s just one of the things that we need to do. It’s part of that high risk (that) I’m talking about,” the chief said.
Strickling also pointed to federal and state compliance requirements for Medicare and Medicaid, as well as private insurance companies.
The chief said the fire department, with its increased call volumes, will be close to recovering $2 million this year in rescue squad transports.
“That’s at risk if we don’t clean up some of our regulations and things that we need to do and our regulatory compliance. Again, to echo what I said in budget hearings (last week), $2 million now is over the amount that, that the safety portion of (the city’s) PRIDE tax gives to all of safety.
“It’s not a insignificant amount and I want make sure everybody understands that,” Strickling said, adding the department would lose one firefighter position to add the new assistant chief slot.
4th Ward Councilman Alomar Davenport, who declined to participate in the executive session two weeks ago, thanked Strickling for his presentation.
“You laid out a very compelling argument for why this position is needed. I, for one, want to thank you for doing so. I do believe it is crucial for the citizens of Mansfield to understand why this is needed and (during the last council meeting), we did not do that.
“We need this information in public,” Davenport said.
Meier said she has always supported fire department requests during her three years on City Council.
“I absolutely see the need for this position after our discussion from the last meeting. I feel like we’ve gotten quite a bit of information tonight and I’m wondering, do we have to vote on this this evening? Can we have a little bit more time? Is there, is there an issue if we don’t?
“I don’t know how the rest of my colleagues feel, but is there an issue with postponing the vote?” Meier asked.
Davenport said he would support a motion to delay the vote until Nov. 15 to allow the public to weigh in on the proposal.
“I’ve said it a million times. None of our votes is our own. None of us have spoke to any constituents about anything that we are talking about today because we just got the information. We cannot say that we are for the people if we are not getting feedback from the people,” Davenport said.
Zader disagreed.
“I have gathered a lot of this information because I’ve been in the fire department and I’ve talked to the chiefs. So I have talked to my constituents about these things that are happening, so just a point of clarification there,” Zader said.
“I understand the need. I have spent a lot of time (with the fire department) over the last few weeks. I have learned a lot about what you do,” Zader said.
Scott said he felt the need to wait for two weeks to allow for public feedback.
“We (also) have two of our colleagues that are not here tonight. I think in all due respect to them, they ought to be granted the privilege of being able to cast their vote on this,” Scott said.
The vote to delay by Akuchie came after he spoke during the meeting in support of the issue.
“Chief, for me, I have heard everything that I need to hear. You have explained it properly,” the 3rd Ward councilman said.
