Vote of No Confidence For EC Fire Chief Made By Local 365 Firefighters
Monday evening membership of the East Chicago Professional Firefighters Local 365 voted overwhelmingly a “Vote of No Confidence” in EC Fire Chief Anthony Serna.
The Local 365 press release stated, After much consideration and exhausting all plausible avenues of recourse, the membership of the East Chicago Fire Department having come to the following conclusion:
“We have lost all faith and confidence in the ability of Fire Chief Anthony Serna to lead the East Chicago Fire Department.”
“Fire Chief Anthony Serna has failed in his duties to provide a safe, efficient, and cost-effective fire service in the City of East Chicago. Fire Chief Anthony Serna’s actions and statements have compromised the safety of the citizens of East Chicago and the firefighters sworn to protect them.”
“Fire Chief Anthony Serna has compromised the safety of the firefighters and community in his actions of restructuring the East Chicago Fire Department without utilizing historical fire run data, the use of modeling, statistics, national and proven industry standards relating to staffing and resource deployment,” Local 365 stated. “His actions have cost the citizens of East Chicago enormous financial costs and have decreased the readiness of the fire department to respond to calls of emergency service.” “He has demoralized the firefighters under his command and abused the power of his office,” The Local said Monday.
The Local provided this reasoning for the vote
● On December 4th with only three days’ notice, Fire Chief Anthony Serna issued a series of memorandums which restructured the fire department. Chief Serna eliminated a cost effective and proven industry standard shift of 24 hours on and 48 hours off to an unheard of eight-hour rotating swing schedule. Fire fighters are now required to work 7 days a week, one day a firefighter works days, the next day the firefighter works an afternoon shift, and the following day the firefighter works midnights. This schedule rotation continues in perpetuity, effectively requiring a firefighter to be at work in some capacity 365 days a year and has not been implemented in a single department in the United States. Fire Chief Anthony Serna implemented the schedule without regard to the adverse physical, emotional or cognitive health effects on the firefighters. Firefighters must be in peak physical and cognitive form to perform the duties required of them. Sleep deprivation is a well- studied topic within the fire service and Fire Chief Anthony Serna has demonstrated a blatant disregard for the health and welfare of the firefighters under his command in regard to their readiness to be able to respond to an emergency with the City of East Chicago in a safe and effective manner.
● Fire Chief Anthony Serna’s memorandum 19-030, created a fourth shift when he moved the firefighters to the rotating 8-hour schedule. This change has decreased the number of firefighters assigned to each shift. Chief Serna also removed a front-line engine company from service during his restructuring. The removal from service of Engine 4, which is the first due attack pumper for the Calumet area of East Chicago, greatly diminished the safety of the residents in that area and hindered the ability of the Fire Department to provide timely and effective emergency response and has compromised the fire departments operational performance.
Fire Chief Anthony Serna on April 8th 2020, without notice to the membership nor the senior leadership in charge of fire suppression, closed station 5. Chief Serna’s continued action of restructuring the deployment and allocation of Fire Department resources is placing an unnecessary and dangerous burden on the ability of the Fire Department to meet the needs of the community.
Fire department operational performance is a function of three considerations; resource availability/reliability, department capability and overall operational effectiveness. The lack of available resources (Engine Company and decreased Firefighters per shift) has decreased the capability of the fire department to respond to multiple incidents. It has also compromised the East Chicago Fire Department’s ability to both receive and provide reciprocal mutual aid agreements to the communities surrounding the City of East Chicago. The provision of fire protection is an essential service that governments must provide. However, in order for this service to be effective and efficient it must be staffed and organized appropriately to address emergencies as they occur in an equitable manner. Fire Chief Anthony Serna in his actions of continual restructuring of the fire department has created sub-optimal staffing of arriving units that is delaying the ability of a fire attack, thus allowing the fire to progress to more dangerous conditions for firefighters and civilians. Staffing deficiencies on primary fire suppression apparatus negatively affects the ability of the fire department to safely and effectively mitigate emergencies and therefore correlates directly with higher risks and increased losses, both physically and economically.
● Fire Chief Anthony Serna also removed the Inspector Captains from the East Chicago Fire Prevention Bureau and reassigned them to fire suppression in the creation of a fourth shift due to lack of staffing to support a 4th shift. Fire protection within the City of East Chicago is delivered in two methods, Fire Suppression and Fire Prevention. The fire prevention Bureau is tasked with preventing fire and life-threatening conditions prior to them occurring and educating the public on fire safety. This action has significantly decreased the public fire safety education within the city as well as the regular and reinspection of public spaces, schools, businesses and industry. Fire and Life Safety inspections of schools, business and industry within the city is vital to the safety of citizens, firefighters and property. The Fire Prevention Bureau is the both the first line of defense and the most cost-effective protection provided by the fire department.
● Fire Chief Anthony Serna has mismanaged the East Chicago Fire Department since he took office in July 2016. Chief Serna has abused his authority and position as fire chief to retaliate against and demoralize the membership of the East Chicago Fire Department. Throughout his tenure as Chief, he has weaponized his office by issuing unsafe orders and directives to the firefighters when they bring forth safety concerns. In his most recent act of harassment, he has issued the order of the removal of the beds from the fire stations because the Union brought forth concerns of unsafe working conditions in regard to his COVID-19 policy. On October 2nd a firefighter made notification to Chief Serna while the firefighter was on shift, that they were living in the same house with a confirmed COVID-19 individual. Chief Serna allowed this firefighter to continue their shift, thus exposing an entire crew and Station to COVID-19, subsequently resulting in 6 firefighters contracting the virus. This caused a decrease in staffing on fire department apparatus and an increase in costs to the taxpayers of East Chicago due to the need for overtime. Chief Serna has taken minimal effective action to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 throughout the fire department, he has not communicated with the members of the fire department the Incident Action Plan for COVID-19. He refuses to pay firefighters who have tested positive for COVID-19 due to his negligence, despite the fact that the federal government, through the CARES act funding, pays for the payroll and overtime costs when a first responder tests positive for COVID-19.
● Fire Chief Anthony Serna has failed to maintain adequate staffing levels of the East Chicago Fire Department due to his lack of leadership, vision and management skills. In the last few years, the Fire Department has lost over 15 firefighters and more are slated to be leaving due to the lack of leadership, hostility and retaliation by Chief Serna. Firefighter retention has never been an issue within the fire department until recent years. Chief Serna has repeatedly told firefighters “East Chicago was here before you and will be here after you leave”, “as long as we get their best three years, we’re good” and “If you don’t like it, leave”. These statements are hostile and do nothing to improve the retention of new recruits. The time, effort and financial cost to the citizens of East Chicago is tremendous when the turnover rate of an employee is high and the retention rate is as low as it currently is.
● Fire Chief Anthony Serna has repeatedly demonstrated his contempt towards the firefighters for bringing forth safety violations that jeopardize the health and safety of the firefighters and the public. He has no regard towards crew continuity and has used transfers and reassignments of firefighters to different engine companies and different shifts as a form of harassment and retaliation. This is demonstrated by the fact that he has issued over 75 transfer/reassignment memos that resulted in over 300 instances of firefighters being reassigned from their Company assignments within a span of three years. Chief Serna’s use of transfers and reassignments as a form of punishment and retaliation has created a work environment of chaos, confusion and had disrupted crew continuity. Crew continuity is extremely important in the fire service, the longer a crew works together, the more efficient and safer that crew becomes.
Wow, sounds like the old command when I worked for C.P. ( not the fire dept )……we were told there was 10 others in line for our job if we couldn’t cut it…..
This is what happens when you get a megalomaniac with a napoleon complex in a position of authority that is employed by a municipality…….they think they are invincible. I lived it and worked through it, and the best day was when my former boss got busted down to a laborer! I told him that the higher you climb that ladder, the further you have to fall.
I at least retired as a Supervisor, he’s still slogging along titled as a laborer…..haha…..