Budget : Budget cuts could leave Butte County with vacant fire stations and up to 23 less firefighters

Budget calls for proposed county fire cuts

By ELIZABETH DE ALWIS - MediaNews Group

Several proposed budget cuts to Cal Fire-Butte County could leave Butte County with vacant fire stations and up to 23 less firefighters.

Proposed recommendations from the county administrative office reportedly include 11 immediate layoffs and the closure of up to eight fire stations, as well as 12 additional layoffs in coming months.

The county Board of Supervisors has yet to take action on this issue, but is expected to discuss it at its Tuesday meeting.

According to two Butte County fire captains and union officers, Mike Lopez and Jason Finney, the proposed cuts could erase fire protection at six stations during the winter months in addition to two stations that could be closed during any time of the year.

Fire stations in Paradise (Station No. 35), Stirling City, Jarbo Gap, Forest Ranch, Harts Mills and Robinson Mill would close immediately for winter months along with two stations anywhere in Butte County.

"This is paramount," Finney said.

The cuts are proposed to last two years. Eleven layoff notices were issued to firefighters earlier this week. In addition, 12 more firefighters, including battalion chiefs, prevention officers, captains and training officers as well as office personnel, could be laid off effective by July.

Lopez and Finney said these cuts would put the public at a huge risk. Firefighters respond to traffic accidents and medical emergencies as well as structure fires and wildland fires.

Darrel Wilson, chairman of the Butte County Fire Safe Council and vice chairman of the Upper Ridge Coordinating Council, agrees the cuts would be dangerous to the public.

"I think it's a criminal act," he said. "I think with all this budget chicanery, we should find at least enough money to supply fire needs and police needs."

The biggest budget in California history was passed and now the fire department has to be cut. "That doesn't make any sense," he said.

In Butte County, Wilson said, much of the population lives in rural area, where there have to be rural fire stations. Closing these stations will mean longer response times by firefighters to a fire.

The state keeps asking for more taxpayer money, but cuts back on services like fire and protection, Wilson said. Butte County just had one of the worst fire seasons in its history, "if not the worst & and it could happen again," he said.

"This is the wrong time to be cutting the fire department," he added, especially in a drought year.

Closed fire stations would also impact firefighters' ability to fight fires. They must adhere to a federal standard called "two in, two out," meaning if two firefighters go into a structure fire, two more must be outside to back them up. If one engine gets to a fire, they can't go in until the second engine arrives.

"We can't even go in to attack it," Finney said. "That's a federal policy and we can't violate that."

That is the immediate risk, but the proposed cuts also put firefighters at long-term risk, Lopez explained. With not enough firefighters employed, they will be on the job for longer hours and during summer fires, they experience extended exposure to all of the climate elements that go along with fighting fires.

Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Linda, agreed that these cuts would put the public at risk. He said the government has enough fraud and waste.

"The fire department is not the place to cut," he said.

There are a lot of programs with no benefit to the state and the legislature keeps mishandling the budget, he said.

"Punishing the fire department and public safety is really not the direction to go in."

For the 2008-09 fiscal year, the fire departments have had to cut $1.7 million. Nearly $1 million has already been cut, but an additional $800,000 must be cut before July. For the 2009-10 fiscal year, the departments must cut $3.8 million.

Elizabeth De Alwis is a writer for the Paradise Post.
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