Challenges with the city budget are causing an overhaul. Starting Monday more than a dozen firefighters will be pulled from headquarters downtown and dispersed across the city.
"Basically it's from shifting around some resources as you knew at beginning of the year budget constraints and we had to eliminate 18 positions,” Kenneth Slatkovsky, City of Savannah says.
No one is fired and there are no layoffs. But Slatkovsky says there is a vacancy of positions that require some shifting. Meaning those 15 firefighters who perform water and land rescues on Engine 16 and the Fire Boat will be relocated.
"There will still be a fully functioning engine out of the downtown Oglethorpe fire station and they'll be 7 full-time firefighters on staff. The 15 men and women that staff the fireboat engine we call it they will be dispersed throughout the city,” Slatkovsky said
The downtown Station 3 on Oglethorpe is one of the busiest in the city. According to the fire department, in 2017 on Engine 16, Marine 1 and 2 firefighters responded to a total of 769 calls.
"The fireboat will still be maintained minimum maintenance on it so if there is a fire on the river or something we can still deploy the 15 who are trained on the fireboat we just have to pull them from different engines,” Slatkovsky said.
I asked Slatkovsky if this is a result of the controversial fire fee that wasn't passed. But he says budgets are always a challenge. "There is always budget restraints. and we're going to face the same budget restraints heading into fy 19,” he says.
They do not expect a decrease in response times with 333 firefighters staffed across the city.
But say should they need to perform a water rescue they have other resources such as tugboats and the coast guard. However, those 15 firefighters will remain on standby
The fireboat and Engine 16 will continue to be maintained. The fireboat will stay in the water.
