IAFF: Part-time “Leaders”
Using the firehouse as an excuse
Frank Lima is the secretary-treasurer of the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF), located in Washington, D.C., a 300,000 member labor union with an annual operating budget of around $75,000,000.
He is also a fire captain with the Los Angeles City Fire Department (LAFD) located in California.
He’s either a very busy man or one or both jobs do not require a lot of work.
Frankie is well-to-do by firefighter standards. In Washington, D.C., he makes a minimum of $330,000 and in L.A., $130,000.
Nice work if you can get it.
Frankie is not alone.
Ed “Edzo” Kelly, president of the IAFF, continues to work for the Boston, MA, fire department while also employed part-time for the IAFF at an annual salary of at least $330,000.
An excuse they employ is they are doing it to “keep in touch” with the rank and file.
They’ve been firefighters way long enough to understand what the job entails and what is needed to protect the members of our union.
(I retired from the fire service after 23 years and went to work at the IAFF. I can assure you by the time I arrived there I knew what the troops faced--it’s in my bones.)
So suggesting they are doing it to “keep in touch” is bull shit.
Rewind just a few years and you’ll see how absurd and preposterous their arrangement truly is.
The late IAFF president Al Whitehead, also from L.A., didn’t need to “pull shifts” in the firehouse to stay in touch. After being elected he moved to close by Fairfax, Virginia.
And “fireman’s fireman” secretary-treasurer Vinnie Bollon, formerly of FDNY Ladder 31 during the “fire wars” era knew when it was time to hang up the turnouts. As an IAFF officer he also moved to the D.C. area.
Both Al and Vinnie would have a field day with Kelly and Lima seemingly unable to make up their minds about what they want as if having to choose an ice cream flavor at the corner bodega.
It’s likely the real truth is that they don’t want to move to D.C. and have contrived a phony reason to stay put playing part-time IAFF leaders from afar.
Many leaders of larger IAFF local unions have full release from field assignments making the Edzo/Frankie scheme even more ridiculous.
Very rare indeed is the IAFF member tapped to work in D.C. who willingly moves there.
Ironically this is more of the Schaitberger legacy. President-for-life Harold Schaitberger worked briefly in the fire department before coming to the IAFF, so Edzo and Frankie can use his brevity as a firefighter as the reason for their charade: We are the real thing!
It’s true that Schaitberger was out of touch while in D.C. but Frankie and Edzo are out-of-touch out of D.C. There is no real difference.
How do they pull this off?
Schaitberger turned the IAFF into his personal empire by buying off the vice-presidents and wining and dining local union fat cats.
Keep the pussy cats happy and purring and you can do as you please, even keep your day job because it keeps you close to home.
So Edzo and Frankie came up with “pull shifts to stay in touch”
And you bought it.
Suckers!
Cheers.
