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  • KFOX Report On FD Hiring Practices 03/08
    Updated On: Mar 10, 2008

    EL PASO, Texas -- The El Paso Fire Department's pre-certified firefighter program, an alternative to the traditional training, has critics saying it cuts corners. KFOX obtained documents that show why some veterans say some of their fellow firefighters shouldn't be on the job at all. They climb 105-foot ladders, drive trucks weighing more than 40,000 pounds and rush into burning buildings when no one else will. Now El Paso firefighters may face an emergency in their own ranks. A KFOX investigation found the department has already spent $2 million of the $2.5 million allocated by the city for overtime. The reason? Not enough firefighters. "Right now we're 67 firefighters less than our total. It is supposed to be 940, we are at 873," said Lt. Mario Hernandez, the EPFD spokesman. Hernandez said the problem should be alleviated in a few weeks when 18 pre-certified firefighters are expected to graduate from the El Paso Community College certification program. They will be the latest graduates of a program that started five years ago. "By the end of this year, we should have over 84 new firefighter trainees out on the line helping us fight fires, so that ought to help a lot with this overtime," Hernandez said. That sounds like the end of the story, but those already in the department told KFOX it's just the beginning of a much deeper problem. A current firefighter agreed to speak with KFOX but only anonymously. He said the academy has changed since the days when he was trying to get into the department. "The training was tougher. There was in my opinion, a better firefighter coming out," he said. He believes the difference lies with the alternative training program. Under it, certified firefighter from other cities can test into the El Paso Fire Department. But the pre-certification program also opens the door to others with no training. And critics say many leave the program with no practical knowledge. Our source said, "A lot of the training is pencil whipped and what I mean by that is the state requires a certain amount of hours per class. Forced entry, so many hours, vehicle extrication, so many hours. They don't have that equipment at the community college so it is pencil whipped, saying that it was covered in class, when in fact it was covered in lecture and not shown in any way." He said lack of vital knowledge may be putting the greater community at risk, "Some of the vehicle extrication or the jaws of life, a lot of that they really don't know how to use and on the job, on an incident is not the time you want to learn how to use a piece of equipment." Hernandez insists the training is sufficient. "So these trainees once they graduate they will be assigned an FTO, a field training officer, but at the same time the public can be assured that the training academy did produce an ISO Class 1 firefighter ." But KFOX found failing test scores from some of the December graduates of the pre-certified program. Failing grades on more than one test. Scores like 52,58 and 59 percent, all from people who now work for the El Paso Fire Department. We also found some trainees shouldn't have made it into the program in the first place. Some graduates from the alternative program have upwards of 40 traffic citations. These are some of the same firefighters driving fire trucks throughout the city. "Hiring personnel or trying to hire people with a minimum of 20 tickets and only being 23-24 years old, that can be a safety issue especially driving multimillion dollars of equipment. Unfortunately because of our staffing problems, we are going to have to hire them because we just need the numbers at this point," our anonymous source said. The department denies public safety is compromised, saying, "That is the reason why the fire department does its own background checks, because we want to make sure that the people that do come on the job have a good background and we don't want to put anyone out there that would endanger the life of the public." But the fire department's own records show firefighters with DWI arrests, aggravated assault charges, burglary charges and even theft. We found one firefighter was hired after he was arrested three times on DWI charges. "The time will come when an incident is going to happen and people are going to get hurt because of the choices the city has made in cutting budgets and cutting personnel and not filling staffing the way it is supposed to be filled," said one firefighter . Weeks after KFOX requested an interview with the top instructor from the El Paso Community College fire certification program, they contacted us the morning the story aired. Richard Bahena of the community college said they follow pre-certification standards from the state and nearly all of the staff teaching the class are either current or former firefighters. We were referred to a safety officer Chief John Davis of the El Paso Fire Department about the traffic citations. He said the department takes into consideration when a citation was received and what the ticket was for when someone applies for the job. He also said each driver's habits are carefully monitored by colleagues and supervised by training staff.

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