Darren Rivers, Jersey City’s new fire chief, says despite the trials and tribulations that he faces after a month on the job, he has no second thoughts about being the man in charge.
“I could have just taken my retirement and walked away. I’ve been in the fire department for 28 years,” said Rivers, who was sworn in to his $177,000 per year post on Sept. 24 and is the city’s first African-American fire chief. “But I’m not the type of the person to walk away because something is too difficult.”
However, Rivers couldn’t be faulted for reconsidering his new post as he looks at the various problems he will have to tackle.
They start with the recent decision by the city to have the Police Department take over the duties of investigating suspicious fires after arson investigators have determined cause and origin. He also said the city’s business administrator Jack Kelly told him that the Fire Department may have to scale down from 26 active fire companies to 18 in the near future. On a larger scale, by Rivers’ estimation, the department is down to 499 fire personnel because over 100 – with more than 2,000 years experience combined – have taken retirement with accumulated benefits in the past 10 months before Gov. Christopher Christie’s cap on sick leave payouts for public employees takes effect.
He would like to see at least 70 promotions made in the next year.
“I’m not the type of the person to walk away because something is too difficult.” – Darren Rivers
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Burned by shortages
Rivers said the shortages in the Fire Department mean various divisions are missing important staffing.
For example, right now three arson detectives are on duty, down from 13 at the beginning of this year, because 10 were relocated to firehouses to replace firefighters who retired as part of a cost-saving measure by the city. Rivers said as of Sept. 27, the three remaining arson detectives in the department have been stripped of their capacity to carry firearms and make arrests due to the city’s new policy on arson investigations.
Rivers pointed to 181 arrests out of 406 arson cases made in the five years prior to this year by a fully-staffed arson squad.
Mayor Jerramiah Healy recently called the decision “strictly fiscal.”
“We felt that in this time of severe fiscal crisis, the Arson Squad was a luxury our taxpayers could no longer afford,” Healy said in a statement. Healy also said this decision had been considered by his administration for the past three years.
But Rivers disagrees with Healy’s assessment, arguing that the arson detectives are a specially trained group with an average of 20 years experience whose work cannot be replaced by police detectives not trained to investigate fires.
“When you have two agencies, that creates a void in the investigation,” Rivers said. “Our arson investigators are trained to carry out a complete investigation, not just determining cause and origin.”
All vacancies but no chiefs
Rivers said he hopes the city will not close eight fire companies. He looked out the window of his office at the Fire Headquarters on Marin Boulevard and pointed to a high-rise apartment building a few blocks away.
“If we get one high-rise fire, say a major one like a second alarm, you will need at least 14 fire companies,” Rivers said. “That means you will have 14 companies at one fire with four left to fight any other fire, which you can’t with that kind of manpower.”
A company consists of three firefighters and one officer, with each company having four shifts.
Another deficiency he points to is that the department has only one deputy chief on duty, Michael Terpak, where there were once 12 deputy chiefs. Rivers said the department needs a minimum of seven deputy chiefs to cut down on overtime. He said a deputy chief is the overall commander overseeing a fire and makes decisions on how it should be fought.
Rivers said vacancies are also hindering the training of firefighters at their 715 Summit Ave. location, and the department needs more firefighters for special operations and more manpower for the department’s fire boat.
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Ricardo Kaulessar can be reached at rkaulessar@hudsonreporter.com.
(Poll closes Thursday, Nov. 4)