AUSTIN, Texas – The Austin Firefighters Association blasted Austin Fire Chief Joel G. Baker, accusing him of denying the deployment of Austin swift water rescue teams to Kerr County until after the flooding event was long underway.
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In a post on Facebook Monday, the association accused Baker of denying crews from the department from deploying until Monday, with the exception of three AFD rescue swimmers.
“The Austin Firefighter Special Operations teams are specially trained for Hill Country swift water rescue and are some of the best, if not the best, swift water boat teams in the State of Texas. It is absolutely outrageous that the Austin Fire Chief, Joel G. Baker, would not allow highly trained firefighters from Austin to respond to Kerrville. Because of this egregious dereliction of duty, LIVES WERE VERY LIKELY LOST BECAUSE OF CHIEF BAKER’S DECISION!” the post read.
The post went on, calling Baker’s actions “unforgivable” and alleged the chief’s decision was based off a “misguided” attempt to save money.
“We are disgusted with our fire chief. He needs to be held accountable and fired for his disgraceful dereliction of duty,” the post read.
The association also said they are starting a vote of no confidence Tuesday on Baker.
Chief responds
Chief Baker responded to the accusations on Tuesday.
Speaking to Austin station KXAN, Baker said decisions were made based on not knowing how much the weather would affect the City of Austin and was done to ensure enough resources were in the area in case problems started.
“Whenever we get a request to respond to various disasters throughout the state, we send people, a lot of people, a lot of the time, however this particular incident, this particular time, as the fire chief of the City of Austin, I was not confident in the level of reports as to what impact it would have had on the City of Austin itself as well as surrounding areas,” Baker said. “I wanted to make sure that as the fire chief of Austin that I had enough resources in place to protect the City of Austin, Travis County, and those surrounding areas that we are responsible for mutual aid.”
Baker also disputed the claim that the department received requests for assistance starting on July 2, two days before the flood happened.
“To my knowledge, we did not receive an official request from the state agencies to respond on July 2, the first request that’s been relayed to me as the fire chief came in July 4, I asked my team to do some research and we do not have any documentation of a request coming in July 2, if one came in, I would like to see what the breakdown of communication is so we can fix it if it is a breakdown of communication.”
He says, to his knowledge, five members of the Austin Fire Department were requested as mutual aid on July 4.
“One from our dispatch center and one of the personnel working in dispatch center received a request. One of my assistant chiefs received a request and three other individuals, they are on the rescue swimmer, they received a request. We sent the three rescue swimmers. The person who worked in dispatch, we told no. And one of my assistant chief decided not to respond. Now, an assistant chief, you have the fire chief and chief of staff, then you have assistant chief. When we have these types of disaster on a regional area that may impact my own city, I need my assistant here to manage their particular division of labor or their particular branch to make sure that we have those areas covered as well.”