Kamloops firefighters union ratifies agreement with city

Dec 15, 2016 | 3:29 PM

KAMLOOPS — Members of the local firefighters union have voted in favour of ratifying a new collective agreement with the city. 

Local 913 of the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) took their final vote today, Dec 15, to settle the retroactive 5-year agreement, which will last through 2019.

The agreement will see wage increases of 2.5 per cent each year, which is considered standard for firefighters in B.C. 

IAFF Local 913 President Kris Krutop said the agreement will also help fill in some gaps in employment for dispatch. 

“The challenge that we had in dispatch prior is that we’ve never had any part-time staff, or any ability to fill in the gaps where we needed to,” Krutop said. “Operationally that was a little bit of a shortcoming for us so we addressed that in this round, so we now have the ability to have part-time staff, and we do need them in our dispatch, so that’s an obvious plus for us.”

Both parties were mindful of Kamloops Fire Rescue’s new strategic plan while in negotiations. 

KFR Deputy Fire Chief Mike Adams said adjustments were made in this agreement to allow for future expansions. 

“It should be noted that both parties were very much open to suggestions,” Adams said, “and at the end of the day we landed on some very important points that align themselves with our strategic plan, which we just recently had approved through council. Some of those areas that we’re looking at are improvements in efficiencies, and our operations, allowing for a bit more flexibility, some areas in our dispatch so that we can expand our services and look to other opportunities within the region that we can do to provide service.”

The local firefighters union had been without a contract since Jan 1, 2015.