IAFF Local 385

PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTERS ASSOCIATION CALLS ON STOTHERT TO STOP SPREADING LIES

Omaha City Council member Jean Stothert has spread yet another lie about members of the Omaha Fire Department and as president of Local 385, I think it is necessary now to publicly demand that this type of political grandstanding and "gotch ya" city hall bickering end so the interested parties can do the serious work of addressing the long-term future of the City and its public safety needs. Whether the City Council wants to accept a free donated boat is not a matter that our Association is concerned with but we are concerned with the apparent return to petty city hall bickering that the voters have clearly rejected ever since the dark days of the City Council wars of the late 90s. Civility at City Hall has taken a back seat once again.

Jean Stothert has now alleged that fire department employees were going to Belize on a training mission and that this mission was somehow resulting in an expenditure of city funds. There simply is no truth to this suggestion and when faced with that reality, Stothert then had the audacity to suggest that the City and the media should look into what firefighters were doing on their off duty vacation time. As a paid employee of the City of Omaha Stothert herself is entitled to go on vacation. The Professional Firefighters's Association doesn't have any right to ask her what she was doing in Florida last week just as she has no right to insist on limiting where a firefighter and his or her family can go when they are on their off duty time. She certainly was not interested in what Fire Fighters were doing on their off duty time in the Spring of 2009 when she was insisting that Union members go door to door to distribute her campaign literature and pound her yard signs. Fire department employees are not indentured servants and while that may come as news to Jean Stothert, this Union will not sit idly by while she tries to discredit our members with false innuendo to carry out her personal political agenda.

This is not the first time the Union has seen this type of behavior from Stothert. It is true that Local 385 supported Stothert's City Council campaign. She told us prior to the election, in no uncertain terms, that she was a believer in public safety and the mission of the fire department to provide fire suppression and advanced lifesaving emergency medical services to the citizens. That relationship began to breakdown after Stothert voted to repeal the minimum staffing ordinance in July of 2009. This breakdown did not occur because the Union abandoned dialogue with her, but because Stothert started demonstrating a pattern of irrational behavior that indicated open hostility to the Union's most basic principles. She actually told me that she voted against the minimum staffing ordinance only when she had assurances that her vote would not effect the outcome. This type of political double speak is precisely the type of political gamesmanship that creates distrust in the system and causes people to lose faith in politicians.

Despite my repeated attempts to calm the situation at the time, Stothert went on to threaten political retribution over the four years remaining on her council term against the Union because members expressed dismay that Stothert voted against an item she assured me she supported. She has now demonstrated to us all what she meant on July 29, 2009 when she told me that it would be a long four years if the Union went against her. Attached to this statement are a series of text messages between Stothert and myself which bear out exactly what we are saying and it is disturbing in the least to see a politician mislead the public with her vote and then threaten retribution on those who question her. My efforts to diffuse the situation with Stothert fell on deaf ears.

This sordid incident over Stothert's misleading vote however was not the end. Stothert later accused me, a combat veteran of two tours of duty in the Persian Gulf, of making threats against her life. Stothert alleged she had heard a secondhand report apparently from one or two unnamed firefighters that I made statements to the effect that I was going to "pull the trigger" on her "like [I] did in Iraq". Later Stothert changed her story and alleged that I stated I would ". . .do to her what [I] did in Afghanistan". I have never been in Afghanistan and I certainly did not make the statements relayed to my employer by Stothert.

Stothert relayed these false and malicious rumors to the Omaha Fire Department command staff and others in city government and I was subjected to an internal affairs investigation for allegedly making terroristic threats. These allegations were not sustained and Stothert flatly has refused to participate in a taped interview and she refused to disclose the source of these allegations to the Internal Affairs Investigator. She also claimed to have filed a police report but the Investigator could not confirm that any report was filed by Stothert.

It has become apparent that Jean Stothert is not interested in the truth at all but only in perpetuating falsehoods and rumors to further her own political agenda. She continues to use you, the media, to do this and she is oblivious to the harm she is doing to reputations that are beyond reproach.

I disclose this publicly today because yes, I have grown weary of this pattern of false accusations and Stothert's irrational desire to believe the worst lies she hears about members of the Professional Fire Fighters Association. But I also disclose this today in an open plea to the other members of the City Council and to the citizens of the City to take Stothert's antics for what they are, a side show for the benefit of Jean Stothert's personal political agenda. Local 385 is working diligently to solve serious issues that are nearly 50 years in the making and this work requires mature and cool heads that can see past the emotions and complexities of the competing interests in order to reach common ground. We can assure you all that Local 385 will approach this work in a professional and conscientious manner, and the citizens of this City and our members deserve no less from each and every elected official at City Hall.

Sincerely,
Steve Leclair, President Professional Fire Fighters Association of Omaha, Local 385

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