After the Tuesday night meeting, Fire Chief Don Adams, is shown talking with members of the unions that represent employees of the department. Photo by Mel Toadvine

The special budget meeting was close to ending Tuesday night when one of the firefighters at the back of the auditorium screamed out: “Are you going to lay us off?”

The question was aimed at Fire Chief Don Adams seconds after Jeff Berndt had ended a close to three-hour meeting discussing the upcoming budget and the expenses of the current budget which the chief says is costing the District money and his recommendation was to lay off at least 37 people and stop taking money from an $11 million surplus fund.

But for the second time in a month, the board under political pressure from those attending, asked the chief to not lay off firefighters.

The chief had asked for direction after several suggestions had been made by a blue ribbon panel to come up with a new budget and only lay off 17 firefighters. There was also a discussion of other possible ways to bring money into the department.

Adams was reminded that the board hired him to run the fire department and also that they had no authority to tell him who he hired and not hire or who or how many, if any, they believe he should lay off due to the current shortfall in the budget.

Over the past two months, the chief has warned the board that layoffs would be only way to stay within the budget and each time the board has in the end urged or asked the chief not to lay off employees.

Richard Pringle, the board’s attorney, brought Mark G. Lawson, an attorney with Bryant Miller Olive of Tallahassee with him to the meeting to explain another possible way of coming up with a money stream to keep the department afloat.

Everyone agrees that if something isn’t done to bring in more money from taxes or a grant from Washington, the department could go into bankruptcy within a few years. Lehigh would have no fire department and no ambulance squad of paramedics and EMTs.

Lawson took up nearly 20 minutes in an explanation that it was legal, according to Florida statues, to impose a special assessment on the 125,000 parcels of land in Lehigh Acres.

“That would raise $12.5 million,” Lawson said.

This would be in addition to the 3 mills increase the board has voted on for raising money for the district.

Earlier the tax appraiser’s office gave final numbers out of the valuation of property throughout the county and Lehigh came in with the lowest evaluation of land and homes. Ken Wilkinson, Lee County’s property appraiser, says Lehigh values of real estates have dropped 49 percent. And with that drop, taxes will also have dropped even with the 3 mills, which is capped by law.

The blue ribbon panel of local business leaders and one former member of the fire board gave a Power Point presentation for the board and the 75 to 80 people who attended the 6 p.m. meeting at the East Lee County High School. The meeting lasted for close to three hours. There was clapping and applause and shouts and people going to microphone during the public speaking time to plead for the fire chief not to lay off firefighters. All suggested he wait until all avenues are investigated for a cash stream.

The Power Point presentation was done by Anglickis, Laurie Jerriey, Bruce Boyd, and Mike Wesner. After the presentation, the board, the chief and his administration and the press were given booklets outline the presentation and the budget suggested by the blue ribbon panel. Berndt thanked the board, but members of the board said they would have to take time to digest the information before commenting on it. Members of the blue panel group did not stay for the entire meeting.

Even though the fire department is facing a crisis, perhaps only a handful of people representing the “general public” were there. Estimates of around 98 percent of those who attended were firefighters and their spouses and children.

The meetings have been written about extensively in the two local papers and Fort Myers TV station have been on the story, but still for the most part hardly any regular citizens showed up.

The board liked the idea of the special assessment of $100 per parcel added on to the advalorem tax, which in all cases will be lower due to the lower value of property in Lehigh. It should also be noted here that the homestead exemption does not apply to property in the Lehigh Fire District. Taxes are paid on the evaluation of the property.

The attorney from Jacksonville said the $100 special assessment would include all parcels, many of which are owned by people who live away from Lehigh and are not improved. They are also served by the Lehigh Fire Dept., he noted.

One taxpayer, who identified himself as Dave Wheaton, told the board that they should look at the blue ribbon panel’s budget report before they resort to raising taxes through a special assessment in addition to the regular tax.

“I’m begging you,” he pleaded.

Attorney Pringle said he would talk to Sharon Harrington, who heads the county’s Board of Election Supervisors. It was suggested by Board member Frank Hemingway and others that the vote could be done through the mails. But nobody knows the cost of such a mailing, but they agreed it would probably cost much more to put voting machines in Lehigh voting precincts.

“We’ve got to contact Sharon (Harrington) and see what we are working with,” Pringle told the board.

Another member of the “public” after the meeting told The Citizen that he has a home in Lehigh and owns parcels on either side of his house.

“A special assessment will cost me $300,” said Frank Lohlein. “I, like a lot of others here, live on a fixed income.”

Lohlein says he represents thousands of people in Lehigh and was responsible for defeating incorporation a year ago during a special vote.

“I have lived here a long time and I can tell you the people of Lehigh have never voted to tax themselves more,” he added.

“And I can tell you that my organization of CAIT, (Citizen Against Increased Taxes) will vote down any move to have a special assessment of $100 per parcel. It just isn’t going to happen,” Lohlein said.

The board meets in regular session Thursday afternoon at 4 p.m. at Veterans Park for its monthly meeting. At that time, Pringle may have information from Harrington from the board of election supervisors about how such and when an election could be held to ask the people of Lehigh if they would be willing to pay $100 in a special one-time special assessment to keep the fire department operating.

Pringle also told the board that he had found out that they could borrow money on the two recently completed new fire stations, which were paid for at completion.

In the end, the board in discussion with each other came up with an appeal again to the chief to hold off until the end of September on any layoffs. The people in the room clapped and cheered.

After the meeting, The Citizen asked Fire Chief Don Adams what he was going to do.

“Reluctantly, I am not going to lay off any employees. I asked for direction from the board and they have for the second time appealed to me to not lay off anyone, not yet.”

“But the fact remains that the numbers don’t lie. We are dipping into our surplus fund and we will have to dip into it again next year and the year afterwards.

“We could end up not having a fire department if money is not generated,” he said.

And he added, “This is the hardest thing I have ever had to do in my career, consider layoffs of firefighters and ambulances and cut back on stations and equipment.

Meanwhile during the meeting, Walt Stevens president of the Southwest Florida Professional Fire Fighters & Paramedics, Local 1826, IAFF Inc. also pleaded with the chief to stop the layoffs.

In response to some in the audience who wanted to know what concessions the unions had been made, Stevens said they had agreed to cut all overtime and to keep contracts frozen as they are now.

“We want to protect our members, the firefighters and paramedics of Lehigh. We know the community doesn’t want to see the fire department come apart with massive layoffs. We are talking to the chief about this,” he said.

At one point, Stevens noted with a stern voice that neither he nor any other member of the unions had been asked to sit in on the blue panel panel to work with finding solutions for the situation the department finds itself in during the worst economic times in the U.S. since the Great Depression.

Chief Adams said some members of the department have resigned already.

He also told The Citizen that last week around six firefighters called in sick one day. He said during the meeting that he respected anyone who is actually sick and has to stay home, but he said if they were not sick, it was unethical for firefighters to act in this way.

He later told The Citizen that since he has been chief, he has never had that many people in Lehigh call in sick in one day. What it meant, he said, was moving people around, just to make sure the fire departments had people for emergencies.