Alarms over fire department exceeding OT budget

Long Beach firefighters have gone significantly past the money allocated for overtime and there are still five months left in this fiscal year.

The department was allocated $400,000 for overtime for the fiscal year - July 1, 2021 to this coming June 30. According to city documents, as of Jan. 31, overtime spending stood at $683,985.71.

Overtime salaries were also over 159% at that time and overall department expenses were over 71.9%.

Fire Commissioner Joseph Miller said the increase in overtime are staff shortages due to Covid 19, work injuries by full-time staff and fewer full-time staff members.

Miller, who took over in December, said two lieutenants retired. While two firefighters were promoted to lieutenant, the department has been left with two fewer members. There are currently two new applications under review.

The department is also short on paramedics, having six after four left this fiscal year for other opportunities. One application is also under review currently.

“It hurts being understaffed,” Miller said, “but that means we aren’t having to pay the full-time salary amount. However, we are paying more overtime.”

The department also hired three new full-time firefighters this year, which is why the overtime budget is lower than last years, which was $550,000. The three firefighters, Catherine Lewis, Patrick Cunningham and Tyler Rutter were all hired in March.

“We hope to hire some more [firefighters] for the next fiscal year so that we can alleviate the overtime spending,” said Miller.

Miller said that, since he took over, two or three staff members were diagnosed with Covid and two more were out due to work-related injuries, which “impacted the manpower a little bit.” One full-time staffer is currently still out due to injury.

Discussions between Fire Department Union leadership and the City’s Corporation Counsel’s office are ongoing about the issue of overtime.