FDNY Staff Chiefs: Me, Me, Me
UFA’s Andy Ansbro says get over yourselves, already
You know the story: some high ranking FDNY chiefs have taken their toys and gone home because Commissioner Kavanagh wants them to think about something else other than their perks.
How dare she.
At a recent staff meeting where she was asking for fresh approaches to pressing issues, ten of the sixteen questions asked by the chiefs were about vacation days and how they could use their staff cars.
Nice work if you can get it.
Kavanagh is up against an uber-entrenched bureaucracy of old(er) men who saw their predecessors rise to the sunny uplands of evening cocktails, comp time and staff cars — and they want the same.
No questions asked.
No one mentioned having to “think outside the box” as Kavanagh demanded.
Reading only slightly between the lines, it appears that some of these chiefs have a habit of bullying and the Commissioner made it clear she would have none if it.
Kavanagh could solve the problem by opening a retirement center for staff chiefs where all get toy staff cars they can drive anywhere and they can also earn comp time which can be endlessly rolled over from year to year.
In a move born of brilliance, Andy Ansbro, president of the Firefighters Union Local 94, said, “As far as we can tell, it’s a union issue against management over some transfers. But my guys get transferred all the time, so they are entirely uninterested.”
Nailed it.
And then he said, “Maybe there’ll be less nonsense coming out of MetroTech [headquarters] with the slowdown. Fires are still going to go out.”
Cheers.
