The president of the firefighters’ union says the current number of firefighters and recruits still in training is the bare minimum to protect the city, reports wpxi.com
Ralph Sicuro, the president of Pittsburgh Firefighters Local No. 1, says not only is budgeting for more firefighters a safety move, but it could actually help the city save money.
“We have about 652 firefighters, but that includes 63 that are still in recruit training,” Sicuro said.
Even though that may sound like enough to protect the city of Pittsburgh, Sicuro says the number needs to be higher.
“The administration has done a good job to staff up our department and put two classes on in order to reduce the overtime,” Sicuro said. “But I still think there’s a lot of work going forward to staff beyond that point.”
There was a meeting Tuesday to talk about fire and police department staffing.
“We need five firefighters to fill four on-duty positions,” Sicuro said.
The union claims the Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire needs 25 percent more firefighters to be adequately staffed.
“In order to substantially reduce overtime and severe fatigue, we need to be staffed with 815 positions,” Sicuro said.
Sicuro said this will create jobs and help ease some of the workload for firefighters — in addition to saving the city money.
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