SHELTON, Conn. -- It's become a dangerous and potentially deadly toss of the coin for city firefighters.
"When the fire engines leave the firehouse, it's always in the back of their minds," said Timothy Manion, vice chairman of the Board of Fire Commissioners.
"They are wondering -- could their radios fail," he said.
That's because the fire department's aging, balky and substandard radio communications system fails 50 percent of the time and is endangering the lives of firefighters and residents, he said.
"There's enough stress in responding to any emergency, without having to worry about that when you get there," Manion said Monday.
As a result, the city is applying for $1 million in federal grant money to purchase new equipment.
"Safety cannot be guaranteed with odds of 50/50, for if our luck runs out, we could be faced with tragedy," wrote Charlene R. DeFilippo, the city's grant writer, in the application to FEMA's Firefighters Grant Program.
But Mayor Mark A. Lauretti Monday disputed the claim that the radio system fails that often, even though that's the number cited in the federal grant application.
"That's bull--," the mayor said.
"I know the equipment is old and has shortcomings and needs to be replaced, but I don't agree that it fails 50 percent of the time," he said. "They put that in the grant application, and I don't believe it's true."
Chris Jones, a city firefighter who is challenging Lauretti in the November election, said he's seen the radio failures firsthand.
"It's really a life and death situation," he said. "We put our lives on the line and when the pagers go off, we respond to the call, and we have to second guess if our equipment will work."
Jones said the city has known for a long time that the equipment was old and needed to be replaced. "And they still send us in to fires, knowing the radios might not work and that's just criminal," he said. "That's definitely a sign of poor leadership."
Manion said there had been 12 repairs to the existing radio system in the three-week period prior to his submission of the grant application on Sept. 21.
He said his own radio "burnt out completely" recently while he was on a call and couldn't get through on his radio and had to use his cell phone, instead.
And, there are a number of "memorable" incidents cited in the grant application, including the 2008 fire at the high school where communications were so bad some firefighters said they never heard urgent messages trying to be relayed to them.
Our equipment isn't just bad, it's dangerous," Manion said. "No one in the department is happy with it and I don't blame them."
He said the radios are "antiquated" and so old, outdated, and obsolete it's "hard to find parts" to fix them.
In fact, most of the equipment being used by the 260-member fire department is more than 10 years old, and some dates back 20 years. On average, the city has been paying $70,000 a year for repairs.
And the fire department, which responds to an average of 1,000 calls a year, has been in dire need of a new system for years, Manion said.
The holdup, he said, has been funding from the city, which has recently committed to a match of $1.1 million toward the $2.1 million radio upgrade project.
"I am hoping that we can move forward on this as so as possible," he said. "Even if we have to phase in the equipment."
That $2.1 million would fund 100 standard portable radios at a cost of $1,348 each. It will also pay for 300 two-tone voice pagers that cost $656 each and 60 one-piece mobile radios that cost $2,746 each -- with $1.6 million targeted for various other items, including control stations, antennae and hardware.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
