The following is a response to the Union letter from the Aptos/La Selva Fire Protection District Board of Directors sent to Aptos Times.
The Aptos Fire Chief’s contract is not scheduled for review pursuant to the contract until June 2017.
The Aptos La Selva Fire Board is committed to making sure our firefighters are the best trained, best equipped, and best compensated, which includes time off and benefits.
Criminal and Civil Legal Actions Pending
The Board of Directors understands that it must serve the community by making difficult decisions in the best interest of the people of the District, based on as much information as possible. The Aptos/La Selva Fire District is awaiting decisions of the Sheriff and District Attorney’s Office about very serious allegations made against a union official. The Union and the District have also been charged with sex discrimination, which charges are working through the California Department of Fair Employment.
District Services Study in Progress
The Board directed that an outside consultant complete a study of the District services, which will be completed in June 2017. This is a routine best practice in all public agencies, especially since no similar study has been done for ten years. The firefighters union resisted the study. The Board is hopeful that the union will cooperate with the study and consider its results. Part of that study should help the Board decide about its fire prevention bureau. An experienced deputy fire marshal recently retired. Even though the District pays for all professional education, no members of the firefighters union have taken the courses necessary to qualify for appointment to the position. Therefore, the Board hopes that the study will provide insight about how to fulfill the responsibilities for that position. In the interim, the District’s Fire Marshal/Division Chief remains in place, and private plan checkers review any building plans.
Study to Dissolve the Aptos La Selva Fire District and Merge Into the Central Fire District
ALSFPD and other departments requested that LAFCO complete a sphere of influence analysis because questions were raised at the Board about levels of service at the District’s borders. Concurrently, the Aptos and Central firefighters union asked LAFCO for a merger study to investigate what services could be shared between Aptos and Central. A study group was selected to discuss shared services. Recently, the Aptos and Central unions, and the Central Fire Board representatives to the study group informed the study group that their intention is to dissolve the Aptos La Selva Fire District, and merge the Aptos District into the Central District under command of the Central fire chief. Both unions have told the Aptos Board that they want the Central chief to take over as chief of Aptos. A discussion about the study group is agendized for the Aptos Fire Board on Thursday night, April 13, 2017. Before the Board could discuss the proposal, the Aptos union sent its flyers and mailers seeking to remove the fire chief to facilitate the Fire District dissolution before the public can make the decision to dissolve the Aptos La Selva Fire District.
The Board is quite concerned about the financial implications of dissolving the Aptos District into Central Fire District. Aptos La Selva has minimal financial liabilities to retirees. Central liabilities exceed $17 million, and will rise in the next few years to over $20 million. The Scotts Valley firefighters union has indicated its support of the dissolution of Aptos into Central because the savings will help pay for ever increasing pension expenses.
So far, the study group has not addressed if there will be any improved services to the Aptos District.