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Austin halts hiring of firefighters Federal agency and union raise concerns that department's screening process is flawed By Joshunda Sanders AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Tuesday, August 2, 2005 The Austin Fire Department has doused its hiring until its union contract expires Sept. 30, officials said Monday. The decision comes after several concerns were raised about the department's screening process, the latest of which was a notice in June from the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission saying that Austin's physical ability test was unfair to female applicants. Michelle DeCrane, a spokeswoman for the Austin Fire Department, said that the city's physical test mirrors...

Days before New York City is to make public its plan for managing the emergency response at major disasters, senior Fire Department officials still have grave concerns about the part of the plan that gives the Police Department primary responsibility at the scene of a biological or chemical attack. The Fire Department, in a 21-page February memo to the city's Office of Emergency Management signed by Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta, said that allowing the Police Department to control agencies at the scene of such an attack "jeopardizes public safety." Fire officials, both in the memo and in more recent meetings...

The grainy videotape from the Nov. 17 overnight shift shows firefighter Isidro ``Junior'' Cordero taking a bag out of his sock. He and dispatcher Judy Brito then snort its contents. The camera catches the two drinking beer, dancing and taking more cocaine. It also shows a steady parade of friends going in and out of the fire department's alarm center.

TALLAHASSEE, FL — Florida State Fire Marshal and Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher (R) issued the following statement: "John Kerry's continuous economic pessimism and misery doesn't paint an accurate picture of Florida's economy--one of the strongest in the nation. More than 171,000 Florida jobs have been created in the past year, and more than half of Florida's job growth in May was in industries paying above the national average. President Bush will not be satisfied until every worker who wants a job can find one, but Florida's unemployment of 4.5 percent is more than one percent below the national average....

Apr 8, 2002 LOS ANGELES (AP) - A federal judge on Monday threw out a 28-year-old quota system for hiring city firefighters, saying it had "outlasted its purpose." The system, part of a consent decree entered into by the city and the U.S. Department of Justice, was created in 1974 to diversify a fire department that was about 90 percent white. U.S. District Judge Harry L. Hupp granted the city's request to terminate the consent decree. The city filed the request after rejected white applicants challenged its provisions. "I think it's beneficial to anybody who believes applicants should be judged...

Austin firefighter group wants all rescue operations to be placed within Fire Department. As large urban fires have yielded to the challenge of medical rescues, some Austin firefighters fear that their stomping grounds will be trampled by paramedics. Sept. 11 images of firefighters rescuing and caring for victims of terror in New York showed the public what many firefighters already knew: Medical and rescue missions are more common today than putting out fires. Now, the Austin firefighters union wants to do away with Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services and assume all rescue and medical operations within the city. EMS would...