A few months ago KUAM News reported about the Guam Police Department's chief cutting all overtime as an austerity measure to save money.  As it turns out, Guam Fire Department Chief Dave Peredo is doing some cutting of his own, leaving firefighters who work out in the field to protect life and property literally hot under the collar.

 

With the holiday season upon us, Chief Peredo is accused of being a scrooge - issuing a memo with several austerity measures for firefighters in the field to implement immediately to cut costs.  "It's unfortunate something like this had to come around the corner from Christmas, the only thing the fire chief didn't put on here was 'Have a Merry Christmas,'" Peredo explained.

 

In a memo issued Monday to all fire personnel, the fire chief stated that as a result of cuts in the Fiscal Year 2009 budget he has no recourse but to impose a mandatory austerity measure to ensure the fire department doesn't exceed a baseline budget ceiling imposed against his agency.

 

Those austerity measures include for all stations:

Captain Ruben Olivas has been an outspoken critic of the Guam Fire Department's administration, saying some of these austerity measures could be considered against Public Health regulations.  "You got to remember we're a public facility, we got men that are living there all day long and public health regulations require that we have hot water in these public places and the fire station is a public place," Olivas said.

 

"We work there 24 hours a day; with regards to washing clothes, if we can't use our dryers to use our turnout gear when we come back from fire there inundated with hazardous materials, I can't expect my men to put those personal protective equipment back on in a contaminated outfit.  And again, we have a health concern and I'm pretty sure that Public Health would be very interested in that aspect of those austerity measures."

 

Meanwhile, according to the memo it further ordered all station employees to conserve power, water, and fuel within their assigned duty stations.  It's something Captain Olivas believes the chief and his staff at headquarters should practice, by turning off the air cons in their offices for the eight hours they work.

 

"Further, the men out in the field who are doing all the work out in the elements are to be without A/C from the heat of the day basically from morning to evening it doesn't make sense.  But then again we want to save gas, he's still using vehicles along with this staff," he continued.  "From what I understand he's still driving a department vehicle home or actually to the fire station close to his home, why doesn't he just use his own vehicle the example has to be set from the top and that's what we have to expect."