ORLANDO, Fla. --
Nearly 10 percent of Orlando's firefighters could soon lose their jobs.
"This fire department would be severely crippled," said Union President Steve Clelland.
The firefighter's union is butting heads with city leaders over dollars. Union leaders say the city is threatening to layoff 46 firefighters if the union does not find a way to trim millions of dollars from its contract.
The fire chief has already come up with a plan that includes not filling 20-vacant positions and cutting out overtime.
But the union needs to cut an additional $4.3 million.
Union leaders claim, for them to even open the contract, legally the city must declare a "financial urgency" and show them the numbers.
The union claims the city does not want to do that because it will hurt the bond ratings on the multi-million dollar venues downtown.
"This is literally going to come down to services versus venues," said Clelland.
But the city counters, the venues have nothing to do with it. City officials flat out deny threatening the 46 layoffs. Officials also deny telling the fire department where to cut. They only say that 12 percent of the department??s budget needs to be cut.
But the union maintains its position, and fears cutting 10-percent of its firefighters could threaten public safety by delaying response times.
"If you go into cardiac failure, your chances of living go down 10 percent every minute we are delayed," said Clelland.
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