Norwalk Mayor Dave Light: 'We'll get this fixed'

NORWALK — Norwalk Mayor Dave Light said it was time to put all of the cards on the table. And that happened Saturday when Safety-Service Director Mike White send out a release detailing a number of offenses committed by members of the Norwalk Fire Department over the past six months. The city and firefighters have been in a dispute about overtime hours, which last year cost the city $200,000. It started last week when Norwalk Firefighters Union 1199 president Charles Hillman issued a response to policy changes about emergency calls. Since then there have been responses by Light, Fire Chief Ron Luttrell and White. White's response said the city has documented a number of offenses the last six months by firefighters, including threats to a local businessman, placing tracking devices on a citizen's vehicle, using city rec passes for personal use, using a city vehicle to plow out a personal driveway while on duty, and firefighters involved in the "cringe worthy Ashley Madison case." White said that whole episode is "worthy of a Jerry Springer episode." "I think he was just kind of fed up with everything going on," Light said about White. "With some of their friends and family asking for his resignation, I think he thought it was time to get this out there. I don't like to air dirty laundry out in the media but I have a lot of faith in Mike White." Trying to work things out "There were situations where Mike was trying to work with the fire department, specifically with the union," Light said. "The union over the years think they run the city and the fire department. "Mike certainly had the authority to fire some of them by city policy and the Ohio Revised Code. He was trying to work with them to invoke change. He was trying to change the behavior down there. There are good firefighters ... he tried to work with them. "Apparently, they did not like what he had to say. I would rather spend my time on economic development and provide a better quality of life for our citizens. "We have had to spend so much time on this and we had gotten no cooperation." Why not fire those involved? "We would have had to go to outside agencies to work on these things," Light said. "We had some retirements so everybody could move on with it. We have some regrets. The incident when the firefighter took the truck home outside of the city limits to plow his driveway could have been a theft in office. "I have had council people come to me with these problems. We never had things like this go on down there. (Former chief) John Soisson ran a very tight ship and once he left it was a run-away freight train. "We let the new fire chief try to get things under control. The discipline on taking the truck home was left up to the fire chief." What next? "The first thing that had to happen is we have to get a handle on the deficit spending," Light said. "They have to make concessions like all of the other city departments. They need to step up and work with us. That overtime is just off the hooks. That is the first thing that has got to happen. "The North Central EMS thing ... for us to buy a fleet of ambulances and six more firefighters just won't happen. We want them on serious calls but don't want them following the ambulance around town. "They leave their ambulance reports as vague as possible. All they want to say is 'provide BLS ... basic life support.' They need to put detail in their reports so we can figure out if they needed to be there. Cooperation with them has been non-existent. "The hours and hours we have spent on this crazy stuff. This isn't something we went out looking for. This was dumped on our laps at city hall." "We need to let the dust settle and we are going to have to sit down with chief Luttrell and (assistant chief) Dan Stayer and work on some solutions," Light said. What about the grant? Luttrell said he applied for a grant but was told by city officials to withdraw it. "He applied for a FEMA grant and, apparently, he could do that back in his old job on his own," Light said. "He applied for a grant to hire six new firefighters. We read about it in the newspaper. Nobody knew anything about it so I got a copy of it and read it and you can see all of the parts that were not true. Fabricated numbers ... we hand-delivered it to all of the council members. Stuff on there that was so ridiculous that we had to pull the grant. "The biggest problem with the grant overall is this would hire six new firefighters and pay for them for 36 months. After that, we would be on the hook for them. We can't afford the firefighters we have now. The cost of each firefighter or policeman with benefits is over $100,000." What about the overtime issue? Light listed some of the ideas suggested to him about fixing the problem: Levy; Raise city income taxes; Eliminate trash service then roll that money back into the general fund to pay them. "Right now if you do the math, it costs the taxpayers $13 to $14 a month to collect trash," Light said. "If you eliminate that and make everybody get a tote (for a private trash pick-up) it would be about $20 a month. "Another thing suggested would be to go to a central dispatch and eliminate six Norwalk dispatchers. They do so much more than dispatching at Norwalk PD. They are part of that team over there. To eliminate that is a heck of a thing to even suggest. They don't understand that operation over there." Is there hope? "Everyone just has to sit around a table down there and work this thing out," Light said. "This is just off the hook ... we need cool heads around a table. I would like to get council involved in this. "We'll get it fixed."