Monday, February 16, 2009

Fire Department Hemorrhaging Overtime Pay

PPH:
The priciest month for Fire Department overtime so
far was December, when the city anticipated spending about $15,800 on overtime
pay but shelled out just over $48,500. The total was the most the department has
spent on overtime in more than four years, according to the expense report. The
department paid more than $212,000 in overtime from the beginning of the fiscal
year in July until the end of January. That's $63,000 more than the city
budgeted for the entire fiscal year.
Reporter Elbert Aull points to short-staffing caused by the sexual harassment complaints of two firefighters as the cause for the explosion in overtime pay. Besides the two firefighters who filed the complaints being placed on paid leave, five full- or part-time firefighters were suspended for various lengths of time as a result of the City's investigation into the complaints.

- John C.L. Morgan

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I cannot even believe this problem (the sexual harassment problem) continued for as long as it did. Is this common in this type of work?

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Westbrook Diarist said...

Editor's Note: The two comments above were deleted to reduce repetition.