The Houston Chronicle reported yesterday that the first long-dreaded brownouts of the Houston Fire Department’s service have begun. As the astute may recall, an agreement was ostensibly reached some three weeks ago that averted such an issue, which was first caused by too many unannounced absences among the firefighters. As I have explained ad nauseum in the past, this is largely thanks to an overgenerous union contract that allows most firefighters to receive paid leave without much of an eye or upper bound as to how many people are taking off. Accordingly, especially during major holidays, the department was swamped by ballooning payroll expenses, thus putting them over budget.
The original solution to this issue was simply pulling fire trucks out of commission until the end of the fiscal year, which is the halfway point of the year. However, after much posturing, Mayor Parker and the Firefighter’s Union came to an agreement wherein the firefighters would receive a meager pay hike in exchange for constricting many of the conventions used to take off time on paid leave. The other major provision was that, provided there were no more than 36 unannounced absences in a particular day, brownouts would not occur. However, on Friday, 42 unannounced absences occurred.