Crime & Safety

Fire Chief Skewered For Sick Time Usage

City Council suggests firefighters are using sick time for long weekends.

Minneapolis Fire Chief Alex Jackson came under attack once again at a city council meeting Wednesday for his firefighters' use of sick time. The costs have driven the department over its overtime budget which, combined with  caused by a reduction in state aid, have put the department in a real pickle.

A Star-Tribune report said Chief Jackson refused to answer interview questions on Wednesday about whether he thinks this amounts to an abuse of overtime. He said a firefighter missing more than six sick days per year are required to present a note from a doctor. Large cuts to firefighting staff, he added, have made it hard to replace the missing firefighters without using overtime.

"Could some people be abusing it? Sure," said firefighters union President Mark Lakosky in an interview for the same Star-Tribune story.

Find out what's happening in Southwest Minneapoliswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Layoffs and sick days also mean the department sometimes doesn’t have enough firefighters to man every truck in the city. Until the department , in October, the department was set to close down rigs in quieter areas of the city, including Southwest Minneapolis.

Councilmembers have demanded to know why sick leave usage shot up in the summer— earlier this year—and during or near weekends. Charts provided to the council on Nov. 9 (also posted at right) show that short-term sick leave spikes on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, and this year rose to an average of five per day in the summer months, a trend that continued into October. The same presentation includes a chart showing fire captains accounted for most of the budget-damaging overtime pay, although Assistant Chief Cherie Penn told the city council on Nov. 9 that that was likely due to the high burden of administrative and training duties captains have in addition to commanding firefighters on calls.

Find out what's happening in Southwest Minneapoliswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Councilmembers frequently temper their criticism with requests that firefighters who are actually sick stasy away from work. They say they are angry that the issue has continued to be a problem in the fire department after the police department had previously faced similar scrutiny.

Still, Lankosky insisted, it isn't sick leave but firefighter layoffs—70 since 2003—that are to blame for the department’s precarious situation.

Update 9:22 p.m. 12/2/11: This article originally mis-stated the precise cause of the fire department's budget and personnel problems.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

To request removal of your name from an arrest report, submit these required items to arrestreports@patch.com.