Minnesota chief accused of threatening citizen after meeting. Police are investigating.
Watch Carla McCarthy’s Tuesday appearance before Austin City Council
City of Austin (MN) Fire Department
In Austin, Minnesota Fire Chief Dan Wilson is under investigation after a woman attending a meeting last Thursday claims Wilson threatened her. Carla McCarthy, a local resident and store owner, claims Wilson pushed a chair against the wall and yelled at her. According to Wilson the chief said if her home or businesses caught fire, he has the authority to decide whether or not to extinguish it.
Chief Wilson has made headlines before over scheduling issues and plans to keep its only fire station unstaffed overnight. (Click here and here.)
McCarthy says the incident occurred at a Fire Committee meeting. The committee was set up to address those staffing issues.
McCarthy filed her complaint with the Austin Police Department last Friday. The police chief is handing the probe off to an outside agency to avoid a conflict of interest.
Here are excerpts from an article by Katie Johnson at the Austin Daily Herald:
“He was screaming in my face,” she said, claiming, “If my business or my home caught fire … he screamed that I could burn to the ground.”
She had attended to ask for answers as to why the chief had changed fire department staffing schedule in late 2008 from 24/7 to 10 14-hour shifts with on-call days.
After an outcry from the community as well as firefighters and their families, staffing was reverted back to the round-the-clock schedule in January.
McCarthy told the council Tuesday that Wilson’s behavior was a “disgrace to the fire department and the entire city of Austin.”
Wilson is on vacation and was not at the council meeting.
The fire chief did have supporters at the council meeting, including his younger brother, Larry Wilson.
Larry explained that he, too, was the victim of a fire when he was 3 years old.
“I think he’s done a great job,” he said of the fire chief, adding, “I’m not here to protect my brother. Everything he does, he gets ripped on.
“I don’t know what he did … I’m sorry he did it to you,” Larry said to McCarthy.
Austin Daily Herald photo of Carla McCarthy by Eric Johnson
