Fire Fighter Labor Groups Warn City About Cutting Dispatcher Positions

DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) – Fire fighter labor groups are warning city leaders that emergency calls currently answered in seconds will take much longer if dispatcher positions are cut and their shifts changed, as next year's budget currently mandates.

Right now, there are a minimum of ten dispatchers on duty for 24 hours on, then they have three days off. But City Manager Mary Suhm is aiming to save money by lowering the number of dispatchers to eight and staff them on 12-hour shifts.

"The primary concerns we're seeing is public safety," said Ray Edwards, a dispatcher but also a spokesman for Dallas Fire-Rescue Uniformed Officers Association, who also claims to speak for three other fire department labor groups. "It's going to cause probably two to three minute delays in getting someone some help. For the citizens, that means if someone is choking or heart attack – they're staying on the line."

Council members took up both issues in a special budget meeting Monday. District 9 councilman Sheffie Kadane offered an amendment that would've kept the dispatcher's schedules intact, but it was voted down.

"They're used to living 24 on, 72 off," he said. "Now they're going to be coming in every day for four days straight."

The labor group seems to think that a last minute reprieve could come if the public backed it and pushed the council for change. But there is no council meeting set for Wednesday, and the budget vote comes the next week.

"It was a management decision," said Mayor Pro Tempore Pauline Medrano of the council's decision. Medrano is also chair of the council's Public Safety Committee and said she feels the changes will save money and won't affect the public.

"No, I don't think so," she said. "We'll review that over and over."

Fire fighter groups had hoped a recent city windfall of more than a million dollars from franchise taxes could be folded into their jobs, but the council instead allocated the money to seniors programs, library materials and support for the arts.

The changes would go into effect in October, the first month of the next fiscal year.