May 24, 2012
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CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WSAZ) -- A battle between the City of Charleston and the fire department is heading to court, but the tables have turned as the city is the side that has filed the paperwork.
It stems from changes that city council made to overtime pay for firefighters, where officials say they've been overpaid for years.
Firefighters said the cuts have hurt their response times and left them short staffed.
The city is leaving it up to a federal judge to decide if changes in overtime was done legally. It comes on the heels of a major rift between the city and its firefighters.
It's controversy over number crunching; calculating hourly, overtime and holiday pay.
The city of Charleston filed the action requesting a judge to decide whether or not firefighters are being paid fully under the city's revised law.
"We think we're right on this," Mayor Danny Jones said. "We think we're on sound, legal basis but we need to know and that's why we moved it and we can't wait. If there's a payroll issues we need to know now."
City officials said they want to avoid having to back pay firefighters, if they aren't paying them properly now. They also need a decision they said in order to plan and prepare the annual budget.
Charleston firefighters maintain they're not properly staffed and keep enduring cuts to manpower and their pay.
They responded to the lawsuit with a statement saying, "The Charleston Professional Firefighters Association Local 317 is aware of the motion filed and our attorney is looking into it."
The city said it caught an 18-year-old mistake and are trying to fix it but firefighters have said, they're just underpaid.
No date has been set to address the motion yet.
Keep clicking WSAZ.com for more on this developing story.
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