Evaluating Consolidation: Is Bigger Better?

Several months ago, before Mr Feiner might have begun editing or authorizing the editing of the official Town Board meeting video records to hide what was being said about him, he needed to deflect attention away from the reckless and costly expenses he was incurring for Town residents. He began a rant against the Fairview Fire Chief and enlisted the help of his fellow progressive big government proponents where they carried the rally cry of his deflection under the guise of consolidation. But like Mr Feiner’s flawed and disingenuous referendum for the illegal sports bubble lease on Dobbs Ferry Road, the information they espoused was intentionally misleading, misrepresenting and invalid. They didn't care. This wasn't about truth, helping taxpayers or improving services. No. Once Mr Feiner gets caught in one lie, he shifts gears and deflects to the next issue du jour. That’s what is happening here.

Every consideration must be on the table when discussing consolidation, including what the real, ultimate and agreed upon goals are? For Mr Feiner and crew, the real goal is an elusive one, at least to the uninitiated. He claims its about saving money but his “facts and figures” are outdated and his models are incomplete. Without a fair and honest assessment, the committee he tasked to investigate a fire department consolidation option expended energy towards futility. And, the dissenting point of view, compiled through the eyes and experience of actual firematic personnel, offered a starkly different vision of a consolidation. Frankly, if we are going to expend the effort to study all of this, shouldn’t it be genuine and factor in all the variables? Of course it should. In fact, it must!

Putting these variables aside momentarily, this is about growing government and wielding the power of a new, singular, town-wide fire department under Mr Feiner’s authority. It has nothing to do with saving money. For Mr Feiner, it is about getting press, creating controversy and getting what he wants. But the uninitiated won’t see this. Consolidation increases Mr Feiner’s power base and extends his political reach, giving him control over the fire department budgets. Ah yes, control. Currently the paid fire departments in Greenburgh fall under the authority of their respective fire districts. Each fire district is its own taxing entity and must raise whatever funds they need for all of their costs. This includes everything from personnel pay checks, fuel for apparatus, equipment, right on down to toilet paper and pens. Yes, this all about control.

One significant variable that has changed is the number of departments to be included in the consolidation. Mr Feiner's 2010 commissioned study was to provide a predetermined outcome and conclusion based on three fire departments consolidating. They were the Fairview, Hartsdale and Greenville Fire Departments. But now he’s only talking about consolidating Fairview and Hartsdale. What changed? Nothing. Well, that’s not entirely true. The Greenville Fire Department protects the Edgemont section of Town and Mr Feiner knows going after the Greenville Fire Department would be like throwing gasoline onto the fire with an already strained relationship with Edgemont. No, he’s decided to focus on where the voters won’t pay attention or be able to negatively impact him by focusing on doing his deflection in Fairview and Hartsdale.

The 2010 study proved that a lot of money, time and effort would be wasted to disband the three fire districts, and shutter three fire departments with little or no savings to the taxpayers. A new larger,  more costly and ultimately unwieldy fire district would need to be created and voted into existence. This is not going to be a quick fix. There's also the possibility a new fire district might not be approved by voters. Hmm, what happens then? More importantly, the three fire districts’ union's contracts would become null and void. If the goal is to break the union and its costs to the taxpayers, this is one way to do it. But will Mr Feiner discuss that? No. He stays focused on the sensationalism of eliminating one non-union fire chief's roughly $200k position, claiming those huge savings will help the taxpayer. What would help the taxpayer the most you ask? Honesty, true open government, some town-wide consolidation and an engaged electorate. Most importantly, we would save tens of millions of dollars every year if Mr Feiner would simply stop breaking the law!

Consolidation is a popular catch-phrase bandied about by those with the belief that government is the cure. We're reminded of the oxymoron from Ronald Reagan's speech saying, “I'm from the government and I’m here to help.” He also said government is part of the problem. As any government gets bigger, more and more people become dependent upon it as politicians lure dependency from the constituency. As those who have become more dependent upon government, politicians such as Mr Feiner and others continue to mete out crumbs to those who can’t or won’t rely on themselves for what they need. There is a place for government to help people, just not with Paul Feiner at the helm. His goal is to grow local government and his power base at whatever cost - taxpayers be damned!

What you never hear about is what happens when he and his select follower’s superficial fire consolidation plan fails? He also never discusses the reduction in services for the Fairview residents of the Town. Nor, does he really care. Conversely, costs will increase by making sure Hartsdale’s Fire Department members are trained to provide the same services the Fairview Fire Department already does. What will it really cost us for the public to be served equally throughout the Town? How much is that additional training expense going to be as well as the never-discussed maintenance or update training afterwards? What about the additional personnel that must be added to comply with the National Fire Protection Agency’s recommended fire department staffing, Section 1710 for paid staffing & Section 1720 for volunteer staffing? Most fire departments follow the NFPA guidelines. Also, what will happen to the previously pensioned employees, their medical benefits and other contractual agreements? Are we to assume the many questions not even skimmed-over in the consolidation talks will magically resolve themselves? Hardly.

Several years ago the Town received grant money (that we pay for but was told was “free”) to study consolidating the Greenburgh and Dobbs Ferry police departments. The only reason Greenburgh Police Chief Kapica and Dobbs Ferry Police Chief Longworth agreed to the study was because it didn't cost them any money from either of their budgets along with minimal effort. In fact, because he is a political gadfly, when Dobbs Ferry Police Chief Longworth retired from Dobbs Ferry PD, he was appointed as Westchester County Commissioner of Public Safety, a misnomer of a new name for the Westchester County Police. There’s an entity with a $35 million budget that we could probably stand to do away with.

Westchester County Police offer taxi cab regulation for the County - the only profit generating division of this group, new police officer recruit training, guards at the County facilities and parkway patrols. They also offer a bomb squad that is similar to what the state police offer if requested. How many bombs do we get in Westchester? They go to an occasional “old ordinance keepsake” found in a home of a soldier from the WWII, Korea or Vietnam era when someone passes away or the home is sold and they are cleaning it out. Mostly we see them “blowing up” abandoned backpacks.

The County Police offer a hazardous materials response team (re: overtime/backfill funding/personnel/cash cow - pick one) made up of County Police officers seeking overtime. Backfill funding is the term used when someone is pulled from the job they are performing, say as a patrol officer to go to a “bomb call”, and someone else has to be called back (to) fill in to cover that position for them. There is usually a guaranteed number of hours for the individual coming in when backfill funding is utilized. 

The Westchester County Department of Emergency Services, which is the fire branch of the County's emergency services with an $8M operating budget, offers a Special Operations Team comprised of two all-volunteer response teams for hazardous materials and technical rescue responses, led by one paid Chief. There are no overtime costs, backfill funding, no pension costs except one (Chief), and these teams are made up of industry leaders, responders and instructors who deal with these types of calls daily. Mr Feiner hasn’t addressed any of this because he knows he doesn’t have to. The willfully ignorant electorate only hear him say “consolidation equals savings”.

Can money be saved without consolidating. Frankly, yes. But the return on investment must be weighed fairly and intelligently. That hasn’t happened. One example is the Town operates a SWAT Team. How many incidents involving SWAT does the Town have per year? The ongoing training for these officers and the increased pay for participating on the SWAT Team is an expense that could be eliminated if we used the County or State teams. Another example where money can be saved is with the Greenburgh Police Department and their Technical Rescue Team. It is comprised of police officers and firefighters from the three paid fire departments. They provide the bulk of the manpower for this team. The fire districts pays for their members' training, not the Town or the police budget. The fire district is never reimbursed by the Town for the money spent to participate, for the backfill funding when they are called away from firefighting duty or training.

As mentioned earlier, the Westchester County Department of Emergency Services operates a Technical Rescue Team available to all communities at no cost if requested. Plus, anytime the Special Operations Team for the County responds, the County seeks reimbursement for any expended supplies from the insurance companies involved in the alarm. So there are no out-of-pocket cost to the municipalities.

We have the best responders in the Town and these examples aren’t an attack on them. Rather, the examples are intended to highlight information that is lacking from the consolidation activists. They’re not wrong to want to look into consolidation. But, Mr Feiner’s goal and those of our taxpayers don’t match. Mr Feiner is merely adding another ball into his juggling act to deflect attention from his poor and often illegal actions with consolidation talk. The real damage is what he is doing to the Greenburgh taxpayers if the consolidation referendum carries to disband the fire districts only to find minimal savings in the short term and increased spending in the long term. Mr Feiner and his Town Board have cost us millions upon millions of dollars with decisions against him and the Town with Fortress Bible Church discrimination loss, Frank’s Nursery, WestHelp, Dromore Road, Veteran Park, Brightview, NextG, the list is endless. When Mr Feiner ceases his illegal behavior, we will begin to have a more cost-effective, a lower taxed and A Better Greenburgh.