IFD District Update – August 24, 2015

There was no Labor Management last week, there was an IFD Dist. Meeting though. Below are some updates from the past two weeks.
• FREE INDIAN’S TICKETS: We have a very limited supply of tickets for the following games:
Wednesday, August 26th 1:35 start
Wednesday, September 2nd 7:05 start
Wednesday, September 3nd 7:05 start
Limit 2 per person please.
• Merit Law Changes: The proposed changes to the Merit Law were approved by the Council. These are the changes to to time in grade for promotions along with preferences for new hires. The proposed changes to the time in grade are 8 years on for Lt, 11 for Capt, and 14 for Chief. These are the changes that have been discussed for sometime .These changes will not be in effect for the current promotion process. If you have questions on this feel free to contact me.
• Promotion Process: The written test has been completed, and preliminary scores have been given. There was challenge sessions last week and SME’s have reviewed the challenges and are currently waiting for their recommendations. There are alot of rumors going around about the written test and the challenge sessions. They are not throwing out a certain number of questions because there were not enough individuals that past. The department has had the challenge sessions in the past and there has been questions thrown out, or other answers accepted for some questions in the past as well. This is no different this time. If a question is thrown out or another answer is decided to be accepted and this effected your test you will recieve credit for this regardless if you went to the challenge session or not. After the challenges are reviewed and the ruled upon the scores will be re-tabulated and the final scores will be sent out. I have attached an email that Chief Krebsbach sent out to the department with more information. Please refer to this for more information. The Assessment Phase is scheduled for September 12th and 13th. The Chief plans to make promotions the first week of October. As stated earlier the proposed changes to the Merit Law will have no effect on this promotion process.
• Changes to the Constituion and By-Laws: Changes to the Constitution and By-Laws will be proposed at the October General Meeting. Per the Constitution and By-Laws The proposed changes will be read at each of the next two District meetings,and no comments, question or vote will be in order. Then they will be discussed and decided onat the October General Meeting. Also at the next General Meeting in October nominations will be held. The positions that are up for election this year will be Local Vice President, Local Treasurer, two of the At-Large Trustees, District Presidents in Pike, Speedway, Beech Grove, and the Airport and District Trustees in Indianapolis, IEMS, City of Lawrence, Decatur, Wayne and Communications. Nominations will be taken at the October General Meeting, October 20th and 21st. As a reminder, YOU MUST BE NOMINATED AT ONE OF THESE MEETINGS TO STAND FOR ELECTION. Any member in good standing may nominate a member for Local office and any member from the Executive Board or member of the District may nominate members for District office.
• IFD Recruit Class: IFD Recruit class 80 was sworn in and currently going though EMT school. You will start to see them on the street doing their EMT ride outs on the medic truck. Please ,if you run in to them welcome them on the job.
• MDT Issues: IFD Administration and myself met with ISA and Verizon to discuss the continued issues we have had with our MDT’s losing connection and not getting runs. After this meeting they were able to fix one of the problems but I understand there are some other issues that need to be worked out, but hopeful they will get these issues resolved sooner than later. I know I have seen them have several meetings this past week. I will continue to work on this.
• Building Project: We had our informational meetings to discuss the project. We will have the special meetings during the days of voting.
The dates for the special meeting and voting will be Wednesday September 2nd at 0900hrs and 1800hrs, Thursday September 3rd at 0900hrs and Friday at 0900hrs, with voting taking place during normal business hours for all three days.
If you have any questions feel free to contact me.
• Possible New OT Policy: The OT Committee has presented their proposal for a new OT Policy. This is the “one list” proposal. Basically you can put in for OT on any day that is not your shift day. So A-shift could work OT on either B or C. We are currently checking with IT to see if this is possible and if so how hard is it to get telestaff to do it. There currently is no start date and there will not be one until we know for sure telestaff can support this change. If and when we find this out there will be eduacation on the new policy and we will do a 60 day trial run. After which time it will be re-evaluated. Again there is no current time line for this. I know there will be alot of questions on this and as we get closer to the time of this going out there will be more information to come out.
• Cancer Risk: The decon buckets have been delivered. Please see Chief Abernathy’s email regarding this and please begin to use these. While nothing can guarntee we wont get cancer, It has been recommended we follow these steps to lessen our chances and to help ensure we can enjoy a nice long reirement and be around for our families. I have attached an email from Chief Abernathy that goes into this a little deeper.
• Contract Negotiations: I have received some very good ideas for our contract. Continue to send me any ideas you may have for our upcoming contract negotiations.
• Insurance: We had our quarterly meeting with the city this past week about our insurance. We were given some information regarding our insurance for 2016. We are currently reviewing this information. We have another meeting scheduled for September to further discuss this. We also spoke on the OurHealth Clinic’s. First the Clinic in the PNC Center cannot see children under 16 years old. This is because their MD is not certified to see pediatrics. This was not relayed to us or the city in our previous meetings with them. The second thing was the lack of a clinic on the South side. The city spoke with them last week and was told they still plan on opening a south side clinic by the end of the year. As stated in an email earlier from OurHealth they are planning on opening a Clinic on the east side by the end of August. Again, in the meetings I personally have attended, the city and us were led to believe that the Clinics would be able to see children and they would be opening a clinic on the south side. OurHealth Clinic has been invited to be at the meeting schedule for September.
• Hanify for District 8: Our own, Tom Hanify, is running for the IAFF 8th District VP. If you don’t Tom Hanify he is currently the President of the IPFFU, and has been a long standing Union Official and we enjoy alot of what we have here on IFD and in the state because of him. He is having a fundraiser at Ike & Jonesy’s on Monday August 31 @ 5:30. See the attached flier for more details. Come out and support Tom in his campaign to become the IAFF 8th Dist VP.
• September 11: We will be having a September 11th Remembrance at Manley’s Irish Mutt on Friday September 11 @ 4pm. There will be a ceremony at 6pm and a live band from 8pm to midnight. We will be taking donations at the door for Local 416’s Benevolent fund. We are also working on the Mass scheduled for St. Mary’s. After this is finalize I will get this out.

As always, feel free to contact me with any questions. I will be out of town this week but will still be checking emails and my phone. You may also call the hall or the Dist Trustee Corey Arnold w/ questions.

Corey Arnold
(317) 918-2136
Corey.Arnold@indy.gov

Fraternally,

Hank