Springfield fire commissioner defends running over raccoon
Springfield’s fire commissioner Wednesday defended his decision to drive a department vehicle over a rabid raccoon last week outside his agency’s headquarters, saying he chose to run the animal over to prevent it from getting out into the community “where children and pets are.”
Commissioner Bernard J. Calvi said in a phone interview that the department started getting phone calls around 9:30 a.m. on Feb. 21 regarding a “rabid raccoon in the neighborhood.”
Around 1:30 p.m., he said, the raccoon was spotted in an area outside Fire Department headquarters on Worthington Street.
Firefighters called for assistance from animal control personnel but help wasn’t available since “they don’t handle wild animals,” Calvi said. “We tried to get the animal corralled as best we could,” he said.
But ultimately, the commissioner decided to take a drastic measure in an effort to protect public safety, driving a department SUV over the animal. He said DPW workers later came and collected its remains.
“I think it was the best decision I could make at the time to keep the raccoon on city property,” Calvi said.
Animal rights advocates disagreed. “This raccoon was made to suffer needlessly, crushed beneath a vehicle’s tires—something unconscionable in this day and age when veterinarians and humane societies could have put him down painlessly,” said the animal rights group PETA in a statement. “PETA urges Springfield officials to establish proper protocols in order to ensure that wildlife is always treated humanely and, if necessary, euthanized with care and consideration.”
Hampden County Register of Deeds Cheryl Coakley Rivera, meanwhile, posted a video to Facebook on Monday of Calvi repeatedly driving over the raccoon.
“Why is our chief of the fire department, while using a city of Springfield vehicle running over and over and over a raccoon?” Coakley wrote, adding that Calvi “needs to be fired.”
Mayor Domenic J. Sarno defended Calvi in a statement Wednesday.
“Damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” Sarno said. “Time was of the essence, in order to protect our residents, especially our children and our pets. This was an unfortunate situation but one that had to have been taken in the name of public health and safety.”
He said police “and Fire Commissioner BJ Calvi located a dangerous rabid raccoon that was wandering around confused, agitated and foaming at the mouth at the Worthington Street fire headquarters.”
Noting rabies is potentially fatal, Sarno said: “Commissioner Calvi took immediate action in the name of public health and safety to make sure that not only our brave and dedicated firefighters were safe but just as important, our residents and especially children and pets, would not be harmed — God forbid if this wild animal attacked a child.”
Calvi’s move, first reported by MassLive, is not without precedent. Rabid or possibly rabid raccoons were previously run over by first responders in locales including Shelby, Ohio, in 2019 and Ravena, N.Y., the year before, according to published reports. “You don’t encounter things like this that often,” Calvi said.