March 13--Let the fight in City Hall over the precious, yet few, millions in new spending money begin. At least when it comes to new cars and trucks.
City Council begins its budget hearings Wednesday to decide how Mayor Nutter's proposed $4.5 billion pot of money will be disbursed in the fiscal year that starts July 1, and some fuss is already being made over what new vehicles will be purchased.
Nutter proposed $12 million in new funding for the Office of Fleet Management during last week's budget address.
Though the specific uses of that money have not been designated yet, firefighters' union officials are saying their department is in dire need of new fire ladder trucks.
"We are rapidly coming to a head where we are going to have to put a company out of service," Local 22 president Joseph Schulle said. He complained that most of the department's reserve trucks -- being used to cover for the "front line" trucks that are out of service -- are dangerously old.
"There are three 1990 trucks that are beyond their useful lives," Schulle said.
Overall, 55 percent of the fire department's fleet is 15 years or older, with 10.6 being the average age, Deputy Fire Commissioner Derrick Sawyer said.
While the department does need new trucks, Sawyer said, he doesn't agree that the situation is as dire as Schulle is making it sound.
"If it was up to us, we would buy new trucks every year," Sawyer said. "But we don't have an unlimited stream of funding."
A new ladder truck costs between $600,000 to $800,000.
The department was able to purchase two new ladder trucks last year and is in the process of ordering a new one, Sawyer said. The city has 27 ladder trucks and 10 reserve, or back-ups.
In recent weeks, some of the frontline trucks have gone out of service due to human error, city officials said. On one occassion, two new ladder trucks crashed into each other -- and on another, a firefighter assigned to work at a location unfamiliar to him drove the apparatus under an underpass that was too low.
But one firefighter, who asked not to be named because he is not authorized to speak to the media, said he has been on trucks that sound like they are "going to fall apart."
That firefighter said sometimes firefighters would rather keep a rusty truck than turn it in to the fleet office and get a reserve truck that is in worse shape.
In anticipation of next week's budget hearings, the fire department is "researching" the status of its vehicles in order to give the Office of Fleet Management a request for new orders, Sawyer said. Ultimately that office decides who gets what.
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