City officials call that a start to a Project 14 program they’re confident will be a success.

Skeptics say it’s a questionable use of $5 million in federal grant money that could be spent elsewhere, including on demolitions and home improvements for needy residents.

Taxpayers have spent $500,000 to rehab six homes, including $160,000 on one.

Some in law enforcement say the effort may be well-intentioned, but officers won’t return to the city in meaningful numbers as long as crime, high taxes and school troubles persist.

“I am surprised they actually have six,” said Mark Diaz, an 18-year police veteran who lives in Holly Township. “Police officers have a front-row seat to the fact that we are understaffed. Do we really want to put our own families at risk?”

Those who live in neighborhoods served by the project said it could increase the tax base and attract more homeowners.

“The process has been lengthy in some cases, but it’s been done right,” said William Barlage, president of the East English Village Association, who expects a police officer to move into the neighborhood soon through the program. “We’ve seen a lot of interest.”

The project was announced in February 2011 and gets its name from police code for “back to normal.” Bing has said he wants to reverse a decade-long exodus of public safety officers since the state outlawed residency requirements in 1999. About half the city’s 2,700 officers now live outside the city.

Here’s how the program works: Nonprofits and the Detroit Land Bank use federal money to fix homes in Boston Edison, East English Village, North Rosedale Park and Green Acres.

The homes are then offered to police and firefighters living in the suburbs, who can qualify for up to $25,000 in forgivable mortgage loans.

A similar deal recently was extended to all other city employees, who can get up to $15,000 in mortgage help.

The mortgage assistance comes from private banks, and participants pay normal property tax rates. More than 100 non-public safety employees have started the buying process.

Karla Henderson, Bing’s group executive of planning and facilities, acknowledged the program started slow. But she said it’s picking up. Federal funds are paying to renovate another nine homes for law enforcement, while another dozen officers and firefighters have signed up to begin the process, she said.

“We expect our number of participants to continue to grow,” Henderson wrote in an email. She said two cities nationwide want to replicate the project.

It benefited Officer Ernest Cleaves Jr., 31, a native Detroiter who moved to a Brownstown Township apartment but missed the city. He chose a four-bedroom, 2,500-square-foot brick house in Boston Edison.

He bought it for $50,000 after a $160,000 renovation that installed stainless steel appliances and granite countertops.

Cleaves said he understands why some colleagues may be hesitant to return to Detroit, but his neighbors have been ecstatic.

“I still have people coming up to me to say, ‘We are so happy you are here,’” said Cleaves, who moved in December.

“Every day, I wake up and am so amazed. It’s a wonderful house.”

Others, including resident Harvey Turner, said it’s hard to contemplate spending $160,000 on one house.

“That’s way too much,” said Turner, who leads the Hull Street Block Club on the city’s east side. “For that kind of money, they could do a lot more and split it up among five or six homes.”

Henderson said homes like Cleaves’ can cost more to renovate because they are in historic districts and must meet federal standards.

Turner said the city does little to help struggling Detroiters become homeowners. Turner said he recently helped three families buy $500 homes from the Wayne County treasurer’s tax foreclosure auction. Neighbors pitched in to make the homes habitable.

“Dave Bing has to realize he’s not mayor of downtown, Midtown and select neighborhoods,” Turner said. “It’s a great idea, but the way they are carrying it out makes everyone else feel abandoned again.”

Councilman Kwame Kenyatta said he’s heard similar complaints from residents: “You have to offer some incentives to folks who do live here. I don’t see anything for them.”

Barlage said the city has to start somewhere.

“It’s not just the investment in one address,” he said. “It’s the investment in the neighbor next door and the block and the street that really moves it forward.”

From The Detroit News.

In October 2011, International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) Local 1813 President Patrick R. Martin sent a letter to area fire companies asking professional firefighters to stop volunteering in the Borough of Chambersburg. A letter last month from union Vice President Scott McNew went further and threatened charges under union bylaws to career firefighters who did volunteer.

Affected are firefighters who are paid in areas like Baltimore and Washington, D.C.

The lawsuit filed last week names IAFF Local 1813, and Martin and McNew as defendants. Copies of the letters are included in court documents.

“The defendants have directed volunteer firefighters to stop responding to fires in the Borough of Chambersburg and thereby placed borough residents and businesses in immediate peril,” the complaint filed in the lawsuit states.

Franklin County (Pa.) Court of Common Pleas Judge Richard Walsh granted an injunction for the union and its leaders “to cease and desist from encouraging, sanctioning and supporting a secondary boycott of volunteer fire services in the Chambersburg Fire Department.”

Reached by phone Monday evening, Martin said he was aware of the lawsuit.

“We don’t have any comment,” he said.

The Chambersburg Fire Department, which includes five companies, has both paid and volunteer firefighters.

Union leaders were notified last year during contract negotiations that the municipality would “decrease its firefighting capabilities or transfer much of the primary responsibility for firefighting and suppression to other potential fire service providers” because of budgetary constraints.

“In short, we can no longer afford the Chambersburg Fire Department at its current service level,” Borough Council President William McLaughlin wrote in a letter to Martin.

The borough argues in court documents that the union’s “outrageous” actions spelled out in its letters lack regard for lives and property in the borough. It notes that the Franklin Fire Co. has IAFF members who volunteer in Chambersburg; and the Franklin Fire Co. provides a specialized rescue squad for extricating victims from vehicles and burning buildings.

“The volunteer members of the Chambersburg Fire Department who are IAFF members due to their employment in other jurisdictions are the most highly trained volunteers within the Chambersburg Fire Department,” the borough writes in its request for an injunction.

“Safety in the Borough of Chambersburg depends on the kindness, dedication, skill and courage of volunteer firefighters. The enormity of the union’s mandate defies adequate description,” McLaughlin said in a news release issued Monday.

The news release further quoted an affidavit from James Hull, president of the Franklin Fire Co. In it, he said volunteers are now forced to make a “choice between facing ridicule, harassment and potential discipline, and providing essential public safety services.”

According to the IAFF Local 1813 website, the bargaining unit represents 21 career firefighters.

Chambersburg’s firefighters are paid an average of $56,000 a year, plus benefits.

Court documents state the Chambersburg Town Council suspended Martin in February for 240 hours and filed an unfair labor practice charge with the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board. That matter is scheduled for a hearing before the labor relations board on June 18.

From The Herald-Mail.

Photos From The Field: Firefighters Offer Solutions To Cuts

Members of Firefighters Union, local 522, then held a news conference to unveil their solution to a department deficit pegged at $4.2 million.

Union President Ryan Henry said the city could save the jobs of 62 firefighters by raising rates for ambulance transport by $100. He said that move alone could generate about $2 million.

He also suggested adding three more ambulances to the department fleet that could handle 3,800 missed emergency calls. Henry said the city must rely on outside ambulance services for 5,000 calls per year.

The union estimates the added calls would generate $3 million.

Henry he did not know the cost of buying and equipping an ambulance. He said the success of the idea will depend on a careful cost analysis.

Later, firefighters packed a special city council meeting on the fire department budget.

After presentations by staff, several citizens expressed concern about cutting emergency response services.

Lupe Mercado said, “an option to cut life saving services should not even be on the table for consideration.”

City officials said they are willing to discuss any proposals that could avoid budget reductions.

From KCRA-TV.

The council unanimously accepted an agreement with the Palo Alto Police Officers’ Association that forces the police officers to contribute 10 percent of their medical costs and to pick up the “employee share” of pension contributions — a share that the city had previously covered. The new agreement, which the union ratified late last week, also trims salaries by 1.3 percent, eliminates three of the 12 paid holidays and creates a second pension tier for newly hired employees.

The city estimates that the new agreement would save about $1.4 million in costs annually.

The two-year agreement is a major milestone in the city’s three-year quest to achieve structural cuts in employee compensation, an effort that began in 2009 when the City Council imposed benefit reductions on its largest union, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Local 521. Since then, the SEIU had agreed to an extension of the new terms and other labor groups, including the firefighters union and the non-unionized group of managers and professionals, have made similar concessions.

But contract talks with the police union have proved tendentious for the city, which in February declared an impasse with the police officers. The two sides remain at an impasse but the deadlock is now restricted to one issue — the contributions that future retirees would have to make to retiree benefits, said Marcie Scott, assistant director of the Human Services Department.

“This agreement is a significant step in the city’s effort to strive for equity across bargaining units, to make similar changes to compensation,” Scott told the council Tuesday morning.

The city’s prior agreement with the union expired on June 30, 2011, but the terms remained in place during the negotiations.

The changes in the new agreement are meant to address the two trends that are contributing to the projected deficits in Palo Alto’s budget — the rising pensions and medical costs. Each has gone up by about $300,000 in the past year, according to data from the Administrative Services Department. The rising costs, along with the city’s growing contribution toward retiree medical benefits, are the main drivers behind the $3.9 million increase in the General Fund expenditures in City Manager James Keene’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2013.

Employees in the new pension tier would have their pension calculated on a “3 percent at 55″ formula (3 percent of the highest salary for every year of service after retirement at 55). The payments for new employees would be determined based on the average of the three highest-paid consecutive years. Existing employees would remain on the “3 percent at 55″ formula with payments based on the single year with the highest salary.

Though the contract took more than 16 meetings to reach, the council approved it swiftly with little discussion at about 1 a.m. Tuesday. Mayor Yiaway Yeh and Councilwoman Nancy Shepherd both praised the city’s negotiating team for working hard with the union to reach a resolution.

“Things are starting to fold together the way we wanted them to last year,” Shepherd said. “We’re getting there.”

From Palo Alto Online.

Captain Brian Beckmann, who has been with Fire Rescue since 1997, was demoted two rungs to the lowest rank of firefighter during a Monday morning administrative hearing and will be required to undergo a psychological evaluation and undergo diversity training, as first reported by CBS Miami.

Though the firefighters union said it would appeal the ruling, WSVN reports Beckmann submitted an apology to Fire Chief William Bryson, stating in part:

“I promise that I will try harder than ever to be a decent and professional public servant to the citizens of Miami-Dade County… My family has suffered tremendously and this has been punishment beyond anything I ever imagined.”

A screencap of Beckmann’s comments was first published on TheGrio.com when its source expressed concern at “the thoughts of someone who responds to the homes of the very people” disparaged on his Facebook page, which cites Metro-Dade Firefighters Local 1403.

The rant was reportedly published April 11, the same night special prosecutor Angela Corey announced second degree murder charges against George Zimmerman, the self-appointed neighborhood watch captain who shot Martin after he spotted the black 17-year-old walking through his father’s gated community in Sanford, wearing a hoodie. Wrote Beckmann:

“Listening to Prosecutor Corey blow herself and her staff for five minutes before pre-passing judgment on George Zimmerman. The state seeks reelection again, truth aside. I and my coworkers could rewrite the book on whether our urban youths are victims of racist profiling or products of their failed, shitbag, ignorant, pathetic, welfare dependent excuses for parents, but like Mrs. Corey, we speak only the truth. They’re just misunderstood little church going angels and the ghetto hoodie look doesn’t have anything to do with why people wonder if they’re about to get jacked by a thug.”

Though Beckmann defended his right to “freely express an opinion…not embellish or alter the facts,” Fire Rescue shortly launched an investigation while outraged citizens took to both the streets in protest and the department’s Facebook page to call for his firing.

“While Capt. Beckmann should be able to practice his 1st Amendment protections,” wrote a Facebook commenter, “being that he is a ‘leader’ in the MDFR organization I seriously question his judgment and ability to make good sound decisions, especially where the community he supposedly protects is concerned.”

Martin’s mother, Sybrina Fulton, is a “well-respected” program coordinator at the Miami-Dade County Housing Authority, where she has worked for 23 years, according to the Miami Herald. His father Tracy Martin is a truck driver.

Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez said in a statement that he supports the demotion and has asked for a tighter revision of social media policies, according to Local10:

“The comments made by Captain Beckmann were reprehensible and will not be tolerated. We can’t have our employees, especially a supervisor, making such disparaging comments about any member of our community, much less one of our own employees…
“There’s no such thing as being off-the-clock; we are public servants 24/7 and must conduct ourselves with the utmost professionalism at all times.”

“I kissed her breasts and nipples, as there was no place for my face to go,” the undercover detective wrote in his report of a 2011 vice sting.

The Salt Lake City Civilian Review Board said there was some place else for his face to go. The review board also said the hands of some Salt Lake City police officers went places they shouldn’t.

The board found problems with how city vice detectives investigate prostitution and sexual or illegal massages. The problems were one reason that Chief Chris Burbank disbanded the vice unit earlier this year and reassigned its detectives.

In an interview Friday, Burbank said crimes traditionally investigated by the vice unit, including prostitution, human trafficking and liquor law violations, are being handled by other units. Burbank said he is considering a new organizational structure to address those crimes.

“Not that we’re getting out of vice enforcement,” Burbank said. “We’re just re-evaluating what vice will look like.”

Burbank also confirmed that some vice detectives were disciplined over the problems that were found. The sergeant over the unit received a 60-hour suspension for failure to properly train and monitor his subordinates, Burbank said. Other detectives received written reprimands or orders to undergo training on proper procedures.

One of the procedural mistakes Salt Lake City police made: Detectives in at least three cases in 2011 violated the department’s “no touch policy.”

In another case, vice detectives were investigating a massage parlor on 4500 South — outside the boundaries of Salt Lake City. Once there, the board found, detectives violated the Fourth Amendment rights of the business and its employees by conducting an improper search.

The board also found vice detectives were not booking evidence into storage in a timely manner and cited the lieutenant in charge of the vice unit for failure to properly supervise his subordinates.

The Civilian Review Board issued its findings last month. The board is composed of citizens from across Salt Lake City who field complaints from citizens and investigate them independently of the police department. The review board report emphasized the errors appeared to have been made honestly and there was no criminal or malicious intent.

As far as touching suspects, reports from the review board indicate part of the problem was that vice detectives didn’t know which policies they were operating under. Old policies said undercover detectives could engage in some touching of suspects if they reported it afterward to their supervisors.

In May 2011, the police department amended the policy to prohibit touching. Despite the seemingly clear language, some detectives who worked undercover to catch prostitutes and illegal masseuses were confused about whether a small amount of touching was allowed and how they were supposed to prove their case in court if there had been no physical contact with the suspects.

In the Dec. 2, 2011, case of the detective who kissed the prostitute’s breasts, he argued it was not a policy violation since he had no control over her placing her breasts in his face. The review board disagreed, saying the kissing was a voluntary act on the detective’s part. The board said the detective committed “conduct unbecoming.”

On the same day the detective’s face was in the prostitute’s breasts, an undercover detective violated department policy by touching a masseuse’s vagina while she was rubbing him, the board found. The masseuse later told the review board investigator she believes the detective sexually assaulted her.

Burbank said the detective was not prosecuted in court.

“It did not rise to criminal conduct,” Burbank said.

On Oct. 27, 2011, at the massage parlor on 4500 South, an undercover detective touched the legs of a masseuse as the detective inquired whether the woman would massage him while topless, according to the Civilian Review Board report.

Burbank could not recall on Friday why the vice squad was investigating that massage parlor, but he said it wasn’t unusual for the investigative trail to lead his detectives to other cities to locate suspects.

While the masseuse there refused to perform any sex acts or to give a massage while topless, the detective’s report says he received a deep tissue massage, which the woman did not have a license to provide. That is a misdemeanor offense.

After that massage, other vice detectives arrived to cite the woman and do what’s called a “protective sweep” where police find everyone inside the parlor and ensure they are not a threat to officers. But such sweeps are not supposed to look in places too small for someone to hide. The owner of the massage parlor later complained detectives were looking inside purses.

The review board sided with the parlor owner because Salt Lake City police were looking in purses outside their jurisdiction while investigating a nonviolent misdemeanor.

The board expressed concern that vice detectives were motivated to violate policy.

“This may be an individual failure but it also may reflect some feeling of pressure to produce ‘statistics,’ i.e., cases made, no matter what policies are in place,” the review board wrote.

The reports don’t specify whether any of the reviewed cases resulted in convictions against the suspects.

The Salt Lake City vice unit had been in operation for decades and was believed to be the only one in the state. Other Utah police and sheriff’s departments investigate those crimes the way Salt Lake City is now.

Besides the discipline issues, Burbank said one reason for the disbanding of the vice unit is the changing nature of prostitution. There are fewer on-the-street prostitutes and more use of Internet advertising. Also, many prostitutes enter the trade because they are victims of human trafficking or have a substance abuse problem, he said.

From The Salt Lake City Tribune.

In an unrelated case, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled yesterday that law-enforcement agencies may withhold the identity of police officers who face substantiated threats of injury or death in retaliation for on-the-job actions.

The officers’ constitutional right to privacy — and personal protection — supersedes Ohio’s public-records laws, the justices ruled in the appeal of a case filed by The Cincinnati Enquirer.

A police-union president welcomed the ruling, while the newspaper’s lawyer said it could inhibit public and news-media review of officers’ use of deadly force. The Enquirer had sought the names and identifying information of two police officers who were shot in a 2010 confrontation with members of the Iron Horsemen motorcycle gang at a Cincinnati bar.

Cincinnati police refused to release the officers’ names, saying they were potential targets for retaliation by the gang because its “national enforcer” was killed in the shootout with officers.

The Enquirer received copies of police reports and files with the names of the officers removed, but the paper argued that the redaction of the officers’ identities violated public-records laws.

The Supreme Court justices relied on a 1998 federal-court ruling involving the Columbus Division of Police to affirm a ruling by Ohio’s 1st District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati in The Enquirer’s case.

In a case brought by three undercover Columbus police officers who testified in the trial of Short North Posse gang members, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled that officers had a fundamental privacy right to personal safety. The officers objected to the release of their information to lawyers for the gang members.

The Enquirer argued that Cincinnati police did not provide sufficient evidence that the injured police officers, who recovered, faced credible threats to their safety. The Supreme Court disagreed.

Jack Greiner, a Cincinnati lawyer who represents The Enquirer, said: “I’m concerned going forward that courts may give an inordinate amount of deference to the decisions of police chiefs in withholding officer names based not on any specific threat, but a generalized concern for officer safety.”

It will be difficult to review officers’ histories of use of force and conduct records when they remain anonymous, Greiner said.

Sgt. Jim Gilbert, president of Fraternal Order of Police Capital City Lodge No. 9, praised the court’s decision. “The line has to be drawn if transparency is going to be a potential danger to the officer and his or her family,” Gilbert said.

Columbus police refuse to identify the officer who fatally shot Obbie Shepard on Aug. 26 on the South Side. Police said the 21-year-old was shot after jumping off a stolen bicycle and firing shots at pursuing officers.

His shooting led to protests and, police officials said, threats against the officer. A grand jury cleared the unidentified officer of wrongdoing. The Police Division’s internal review of the case has not been finished.

From The Columbus Post-Dispatch.

After about eight years of oversight, union president Joe King said, city officials and organized labor know what they have to do to continue on a path to financial stability.

“We get the message,” Mr. King said.

He likened oversight to “handcuffs,” complained about the millions of state dollars spent on oversight boards and said overseers duplicate the work of the mayor and council.

“We’ve got to take our house back. This is our house,” said Mr. King, whose politically powerful union began lobbying state lawmakers months ago and in the past week or so began calling on council members.

Mr. King said he wants the city to petition the state secretary of community and economic development to release the city from oversight, and he wants elected officials to present a united front in support of the request.

Under oversight, Mr. King said, the fire bureau’s budget has been slashed and ranks of firefighters have fallen. Oversight also places limits on the collective-bargaining process.

Mr. Ravenstahl, who faces re-election next year, has said that the city has made enough financial progress to go its own way but hasn’t publicly proposed a timetable for doing so.

“I can tell you the mayor has been having discussions with state leaders on that issue,” his spokeswoman, Joanna Doven, said.

Council backpedaled on a previous push to end oversight.

In 2006, it gave preliminary approval to legislation, supported by Mr. King and other unions, that would have forced the Department of Community and Economic Development to hold a public hearing and make a decision about continuing oversight. However, council killed the proposal a week later.

The city has two sets of overseers, the Act 47 team and the Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority. The state spent about $10.4 million on the groups from 2004 through 2011, according to city figures.

“When presented with the facts of Pittsburgh’s true financial picture, and the expense of oversight, reasonable persons would come up to the same reasonable conclusion” as the mayor and Mr. King, Ms. Doven said. “Oversight is unnecessary and too expensive.”

City finance director Scott Kunka said the secretary of community and economic development can rescind the city’s designation as financially distressed and end the work of the Act 47 team. He said the process for dismantling the authority, which was created under separate state legislation, wasn’t clear.

“I’m very interested” in seeking an end to oversight, said Councilwoman Theresa Kail-Smith, chairman of the body’s public safety committee, who spoke with an official of the firefighters union a week ago. “I have been for a long time.”

Councilman Ricky Burgess, finance chairman, said he supports an end to oversight. Councilman Patrick Dowd and Councilwoman Natalia Rudiak said they have not taken a position.

In an annual report provided to city officials in October, the Act 47 team said the city had made significant progress in righting its finances but listed as “incomplete” or “in progress” more than 100 cost-control and revenue-generating projects. The ICA offered a similar report last week, saying the city’s challenges included long-term pension fund solvency and an unfunded retiree health care liability of $488.6 million.

Mr. Ravenstahl’s office says balanced budgets, bond rating upgrades and significant debt reduction in recent years all point to the city’s progress. However, Controller Michael Lamb, a potential mayoral challenger, said the city shouldn’t request an end to oversight until it provides for long-term solvency of the pension fund, which was 58.6 percent funded on March 31.

“We haven’t earned it yet,” he said.

From The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

JLM is panel comprised of management and union representatives whose purpose is to mediate conflicts between unions and management.

Boston attorney Susan Horwitz, representing the Lynn Police Association, said the ruling is a cue for the city to move forward.

“Many of us have been raised and have grown up in Lynn, and many will remain even after the resolution of this matter,” she wrote in a prepared statement. “Lynn is a great city and the officers who work for the citizens of Lynn are dedicated to serving the community regardless of where they live.”

City Solicitor Michael Barry said the decision raises concerns and he is not prepared to accept Welch’s ruling.

“We want the learned judges of the Appeals Court to decide that fate,” he said. “And we are confident they will send it back to the city to enforce.”

His confidence, he said, comes from the charter itself, which he said includes a quote from the Charter Commission stating that the charter is “tailor made to fit the city of Lynn.”

He also noted that no other municipal union has gone to such lengths to “challenge the will of the voters.”

Despite the apparent victory for the LPA, Barry said residency is still in effect until it is settled once and for all either through arbitration or through the courts.

Councilor at large Daniel Cahill said he is concerned what other personnel issues might be open to collective bargaining as a result of this ruling. He also expects the issue will end up at the Supreme Judicial Court.

Police Chief Kevin Coppinger didn’t disagree with Horwitz. He said that he has not found the assertion by the Law Department that officers who live in the city where they work are more apt to care about it to be necessarily true.

“We’ve had officers who do live outside the city who were grandfathered in who go above and beyond, and we have officers who live in Lynn who do the same,” he said. “The vast majority give it their all when they come to work.”

He also said that the residency requirement has cost him some good officers like a lieutenant who left to take a job as an officer in another community rather than comply with residency.

“He gave up a lot and we lost a lot,” Coppinger said. “The best candidate should get the job, and his job should be related to his performance and not necessarily where he lives —and that’s true for any job in the city.”

In her statement Horwitz wrote that the issue of residency is a simple one. She pointed out that in 2000, Salem Superior Court Judge Joseph Grasso ruled that “a local residency requirement imposed on police by city charter is subject to the collective bargaining requirements” and now Welch has upheld the order.

She added that the comments from Barry’s office “demonstrate a complete and utter disregard for these responsibilities as well as a height of hypocrisy when they claim that the city’s charter somehow has relevance in the matter.”

Horwitz also wrote that Barry didn’t necessarily disagree with the 2000 opinion and argued that an arbitrator ruled that police officers not residing in the city prior to May 14, 1999 would be exempt from the residency requirements.

“This 1999 date is clearly outside of the mandates of the city charter which specifies, ‘that all police officers appointed after January 7, 1980 will be governed’… by residency requirements,” she wrote.

Barry said fewer than five officers were given the “extremely narrow exception” because they truthfully admitted they had moved out of Lynn prior to 1999.

“Residency remains the law in Lynn,” Barry said.

His concern, he said, is that a panel of non-Lynn arbitrators will overturn an issue that was voted on by 89,000 citizens.

“In the event that a panel of non-Lynners eliminate the residency requirement, I am confident that an Appeals Court after hearing the legal arguments, will affirm the residency requirement,” he said.

Horwitz, however, urged city officials to begin fulfilling the requirement. “It’s lawful obligation,” he said.

From The Daily Item.

Ten-year veteran Hialeah firefighter Eric Johnson is under investigation by his department for postings on his personal Facebook page. The postings have sparked controversy and have some people questioning if Johnson is a racist. “Absolutely not,” he said in response. “I’m married to a Cuban. My best friend is an African-American. Anything else?”

One of the posts in question is a photo of a man riding a scooter with a goat and the caption: “Only in Hialeah. LOL.” “Wasn’t that hilarious or what?” Johnson said when asked about the photo. “I don’t really necessarily see why people would be offended. It’s a picture. It’s in good humor. You have the option of coming on my page and looking at it or not.”

In another posting, Johnson wrote about how he communicates with the people of Hialeah. He says: “I have a system. Just add an ‘o’ to any English word and bam! It works. For example, how ya doin ‘o.’ You wanna go to the hospital ‘o.’ I just learned that you can’t do that when you say is this your home though. Ha Ha.”

“How you doing-o? You have some chest pain-o? You want to go to the hospital-o? It is what it is. It works,” said Johnson.

Then there are Johnson’s postings about Medicare: “Ha Ha Ha… Jew forgot dat I hab da Medicare… Jew must talk me.”

Johnson also offered an explanation for that comment too. “This is a typical response we get in the city from a lot of people who have government benefits,” he said. “It’s almost like you owe them, you are there at their beck and call, at their service, and mind you, as a public servant, I am, I really am.”

The firefighter is also the vice-president of the Hialeah Association of Firefighters. “This particular person happens to be an employee of government and the public holds government employees to a higher standard,” said Marcos Regalado of the Spanish-American League Against Discrimination.

Public employees and their personal Facebook pages have been an issue before. Miami-Dade firefighter Brian Beckmann recently made controversial comments about the Trayvon Martin case on his Facebook page. Beckmann is still under investigation by his department.

As for Johnson, he is not backing down. “These aren’t stereotypes, this is reality. If anyone is stereotyped, it’s me in Hialeah,” he said. “I’m a gringo in the middle of Hialeah!”

Despite the online comments, Johnson assures the community that he treats everyone equally while on the job. “Just like my grandmother and just like my mother,” he said. “Because that’s the essence of public service. Treat ‘em all like your mom.”

Johnson says he is not bound to any policy pertaining to the use of social media. He believes any discipline would be unwarranted and that he has every right to voice his opinion and beliefs.

However, others say, a government employee should know better.

From WSVN-TV.