Visalia Firefighters Face Furloughs

Most of us hope we’ll never have to need them.

But in case of an emergency, they’re the first people we want to see.

“Every thousand people within a community should have a firefighter. We’re below that, we’re at .46,” Miguel Oseguera, Vice-President of the Visalia Firefighters Association, said.

Oseguera says the Visalia Fire Department is already battling issues.

And asking them to forego a four-percent pay raise and take furloughs is only going to hurt residents.

“The past few weeks, we’ve been having numerous incidents where it’s tapped all our resources within the city. Those calls are still gonna come in through 911 and now they’re going to be pending, be on standby. That could be your family. That could be someone you know,” he said.

The proposed furloughs would include taking two out of the five stations out of service after 8 pm, 68 days out of the year; leaving the city without a truck and only engines during that time.

“A truck does heavy duty work. They do the rescues, cutting into buildings, downtown. They do the heavy work. That’s gonna be out of the picture,” Oseguera said.

“We’re not gonna jeopardize the quality of the protection, fire or police. Basically what we’re going to be looking at is how we deliver the service,” Visalia Mayor Jesus Gamboa said.

For Visalia city officials, however, the issue isn’t about cutting back on public safety; it’s about making due with an ever-waning budget.

“What we’re talking about here is we’re worried about ourselves. We’re worrying about ourselves. Right now is not a time to worry about me,” Gamboa said.

In a unanimous decision, city officials approved the furloughs Monday, leaving the details up to the city manager and department heads.

“You can almost bet that there’ll be a house burned down, somebody will die of a heart attack or they’ll be a home invasion. And there won’t be adequate people to respond because you laid them off or furloughed them,” one concerned resident said.

But fighting flames or furloughs, firefighters say they’ll still do their best to be by your side, in the case of an emergency.

The Visalia Fire Department runs about 11,000 calls a year.

According to the National Fire Protection Association, a city of about 120,000 residents should have 123 firefighters.

The city of Visalia employs 57.

The Visalia City Council also voted Monday to declare a state of fiscal emergency.

Doing that allows them to tap into Measure T funding, a one-fourth cent sales tax voters approved in 2004 that was supposed to be dedicated to increasing public safety.