Overtime pay for firefighters at the Austin Fire Department will reach about $21 million by the end of this fiscal year on Sept. 30 – a 206 percent increase since Fiscal Year 2013-14 – according to a report put out this week by the Office of the City Auditor in response to a request from […]
Austin Firefighters Association
The Austin firefighters union.
Posted inFire
Auditors to look at firefighters’ overtime
After considerable complaint from its newest members, Jimmy Flannigan and Alison Alter, City Council voted last month to amend the city’s General Fund budget by transferring $3.5 million from a stabilization reserve fund into the Austin Fire Department’s budget to pay for overtime expenses. Council on Thursday directed the Office of the City Auditor to look […]
Posted inPublic Safety
Little known on when public safety contract negotiations will start
Two of the city’s three public safety unions are willing to consider a one-year extension of their contracts with the city – but it might not be as simple as giving the go-ahead. Although negotiations for new contracts are set for spring 2017, City Council has said it wants to wait until a new city […]
Posted inFire, Uncategorized
City considers providing fire service to Travis County ESD4
After years of city annexations, Travis County Emergency Services District 4 (ESD4) should no longer have its own fire department, ESD4 Fire Chief David Bailey told the City Council Public Safety Committee on Monday. When it was founded as Travis County Rural Fire Protection District #4 in 1985, the taxing district covered a large swath of […]
Posted inFire
Fire Department says it needs more fire stations
The Public Safety Commission unanimously recommended a resolution Monday that would require the city manager to submit an annual report to City Council identifying areas of the city most in need of fire stations. If approved by Council, staff will develop a comprehensive plan to be presented to Council in the next budget cycle for […]
Posted inPublic Safety
Committee restarts discussion of fire and EMS merger
Members of the Public Safety Committee heard testimony Monday on the idea of merging the Austin Fire Department with Austin/Travis County Emergency Medical Services, but city staff and organization heads reiterated time and again that anything official is a long way off. Before a union of the two emergency bodies can even be considered, Austin/Travis County […]
Posted inCity Hall, Fire
City, firefighters reach tentative agreement
After years of strife, the City of Austin and the Austin Firefighters Association successfully concluded the collective bargaining process Monday. Last November, City Council agreed to settle a lawsuit with the U.S. Department of Justice over alleged discrimination in the Austin Fire Department’s hiring process. When Council voted to accept the consent decree, which allows […]
Posted inCity Council, Fire, Public Safety
Council delays fire department reclassification plan
A proposal to modify the Austin Fire Department’s leadership hierarchy has encountered headwinds at City Hall. City Council Member Don Zimmerman moved Thursday to prevent a vote on the resolution that proposes tweaking the department’s classification system, including removing several lower-level positions and adding two new division chiefs to Chief Rhoda Mae Kerr’s executive team. […]
Posted inFire, Public Safety
Explainer: AFD, AFA, and the consent decree
Each week, the Explainer offers a closer look at stories we have been following. This week, we look at City Council action from last week that restarts negotiations between the Austin Firefighters Association and city management. It what amounts to its first major non-Council-operations act, City Council members Thursday approved a resolution that instructs Austin […]
Posted inCity Council, Fire
Council OKs restart of firefighter negotiations
As its first major action, the Austin City Council on Thursday approved a resolution directing city management to go back to the bargaining table with the Austin Firefighters Association. But it did not, as initially proposed, direct staff to stop the RFP process for finding a vendor to design a procedure for recruiting a racially […]
Posted inLocal Politics, Public Safety
Not all firefighters support pulling RFP
The president of the Austin African-American Firefighters Association told the Austin Monitor that the city would be making a mistake if it stops the RFP process for a plan to recruit new firefighters and returns to the negotiating table, as set forth in a resolution from City Council Member Greg Casar. The item is on today’s […]
Posted inAustin, City Council, Fire, Public Safety
Union reps address Council on employment issues
City Council listened to representatives of the firefighters, police and EMS unions Thursday. Bob Nicks, president of the Austin Firefighters Association, and his attorney took the lion’s share of the time to complain about the city’s failure to listen to his group’s input in designing a process to hire new firefighters. The city issued a […]