Winnipeg’s firefighters have reached a deal with the city that avoids — for now — a bitter showdown over cutting overtime costs.
The fire department and its union have agreed that firefighters will give up a week of vacation to make up for a shortage of fire crews and put a stop to runaway overtime costs.
“There’s a real issue. We need to hire, but until we hire, we need to cover off for those high (overtime) shifts,” United Fire Fighters of Winnipeg president Alex Forrest told Global News Tuesday.
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The fire department says overtime expenses have jumped 86 per cent in 2013, from $2 million to what could be $5.5 million by the end of the year.
For instance, of eight firefighters battling a house fire in Richmond West Monday, one of them was working overtime. Forrest said on any given day as many as seven of the city’s firefighters could be on OT.
Winnipeg’s acting fire chief had proposed idling some trucks and cutting some crews to two firefighters from four, in a bid to cut the costs. That proposal touched off a bitter war of words that for the time being seems settled.
Forrest said the union warned the department in June that overtime costs could skyrocket if vacancies in the ranks weren’t filled.
The city confirmed it will be hiring more firefighters shortly; the outstanding question is how many? The firefighters’ union said dozens of positions need to be filled, and the cash-strapped City of Winnipeg is unlikely to go on a hiring spree to fill all of them at once.
City officials refused to say how many new firefighters will be hired.
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