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By STEPHEN BEALE
Union Leader Correspondent
GOFFSTOWN – The New Hampshire Public Employee Labor Relations Board has ruled that the town last summer should not have declared a staffing emergency in the Goffstown Fire Department without first negotiating with the firefighters union.
"It was clarified to the town that any change in the schedule to the bargaining unit, which is the professional firefighters, had to be negotiated," said Lt. Bill Connor, the president of the union.
Early last August, the board of selectmen directed then-fire Chief Frank Carpentino to staff at least one fire station seven days a week using regular full-time firefighters at their usual hourly rate. Previously, call firefighters had been staffing the stations on the weekends.
At the time, the board was acting on the recommendation of Carpentino, according to selectman Nick Campasano, who declined to comment further.
Later that month, the local firefighters association filed a complaint with the state Public Employee Labor Relations Board alleging that the town did not follow the proper procedure when it changed the schedule. Connor said the association was not seeking any monetary damages.
In its ruling, the board questioned whether the town really faced an emergency last summer. The ranks of the call force had been thinning for years, the board notes, and the town had not provided any evidence that the danger posed by insufficient coverage had changed in severity in the weeks running up to its decision.
"We find that to the extent the town believes that an emergency existed in August 2006, it was one created in substantial part by its own action or inaction in addressing fire service coverage problems before the chief declared that he was disavowing future responsibility for risk to the community," the board concluded.
The decision, reached in mid-April, actually came after the staffing emergency had already ended in February. "In some respects, that's a moot issue, because in some respects the board of selectmen removed that issue," member Scott Gross said.
But Gross, who was not on the board last summer, said it could have an impact on future emergencies the town may need to declare. He declined to say anything else on the issue until he had re-read the decision.
Several months ago, Connor said the scheduling disagreement with the town was hindering negotiations over the firefighters contract that expired in 2005.
In an interview on Wednesday, Connor said negotiations on a new contract will be starting up again soon.
"The firefighters have been frozen salary and benefit-wise since July 2005," he said.
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