$1.5M grant will fund 9 firefighter jobs
Comes after labor conflict, reductions
Yuba City has solved its firefighter staffing problem, for now.
At a special meeting Tuesday in front of students at River Valley High School, the City Council accepted a $1.5 million federal SAFER grant, which will allow the city to hire nine addi- tional firefighters for the next two years.
“In the 30 years I’ve been here, this is one of the biggest grants we’ve received,” said Yuba City Fire Chief Pete Daley. “And this will probably be the biggest one-time hire of personnel.”
The grant addresses the root of a labor conflict that grew contentious in January, when the City Council imposed a contract on the firefighter’s union with staff cuts that reduced the teams at two of the city’s fire stations from three to two people.
At the time, the firefighters maintained the reduction would impact the efficiency of the department and cost valuable time in emergency situations where seconds count.
The grant will allow the department to have, at a minimum, 16 firefighters at five stations every day, plus a battalion chief, Daley said.
The boost to staffing will ensure that the department can get the right amount of people to respond to an incident in the proper amount of time, Daley said.
“There are national standards out there, and this will help us meet those standards,” Daley said.
The department has more than 400 applications to process. The final nine hires will go through a four-week training academy.
Daley hopes the nine additional firefighters will be on the streets by the end of the year.
But there’s still the question of what will happen after the grant expires in two years.
Absent the grant, the city could not afford to hire nine additional firefighters, said City Manager Steve Kroeger.
The revenue picture at the city has improved, and the end of the SAFER grant coincides closely with 2018, the year the city has targeted to pay off part of its pension debt and close its budget deficit, Daley said.
The city received SAFER grants in 2005 and 2007 and was able to retain the employees hired with grant funds after the grants expired, Daley said.
“That would be the goal this time,” Daley said. “If they can’t afford any of them, the next option is to apply for the grant again and extend it another two years.”
Kroeger said it all depends on the economy, which can be difficult to predict. “If revenues continue to increase and the economy continues to do well, I would expect that we could gradually look to add staff to the fire department and other departments as well, including the police,” Kroeger said.