Budget cut roundup: Chief in MI laid off; Baltimore may not fill shifts.

How many times have you heard a firefighter say that if they want to cut the budget, start with the chief and his command staff?

That’s just what happened in St. Joseph, Michigan on Tuesday. The budget wasn’t big enough for both a police and fire chief. Guess who is left standing and is in charge of the fire department?

Click here to watch the story from WNDU-TV.

In Baltimore, Annie Linskey, who always seems to be on top of BFD developments, has a look at how the department plans to cut next year’s budget. The proposal Chief Jim Clack is floating involves rotating closures. The closures will come by not filling slots with overtime forcing company shut downs.

The idea has some other names including “brownouts” and “firehouse roulette”.

Here are excerpts:

Clack said the cuts are deep and would mean making sacrifices greater then “cutting paper clips and pencils.”

“We will just operate with the people we have each day,” he said, cautioning that he is still studying the budget and will present final ideas to Dixon on Dec. 15.

Union leaders were split yesterday on what the policy could mean. “Rotating closures are a prelude to permanent closures, and all you are doing is exacerbating the pain,” said Capt. Stephan G. Fugate, president of the fire officers union.

Bob Sledgeski, president of the firefighters’ union, had a more optimistic view, saying the new policy would be preferable to shuttering companies. “Once you close something, you never open it back up,” Sledgeski said. “There is hope that when the economy gets better, you can stabilize what you have.”