Fire aid is not always mutual

Gloucester has routinely neglected its responsibility to help neighboring communities battle blazes, records show, even six months after the regional fire chief's association sent the city an unusual letter questioning the Fire Department's commitment.

Area fire chiefs say they understand Gloucester is struggling with severe budget cuts, but are concerned about its reliability in a mutual-aid system that depends on each department doing its fair share.

''The issue with Gloucester is, we feel that mutual aid should be mutual," said Beverly Fire Chief Richard Pierce, who coordinates the District Five mutual-aid system in southern Essex County, which includes Gloucester and 19 other communities.

A dispatcher from the district's central command in Beverly calls each fire department daily around 6:15 p.m. to find out how many staffed engines or ladders the department can send if a neighboring community needs help fighting a fire.

The Essex County Fire Chief's Association sent a letter to Gloucester dated Aug. 10 noting the city's Fire Department said it was unable to send any help 19 times during July. (A Globe review of those records indicated Gloucester was unavailable 15 times.) Two communities, Topsfield and Danvers, were logged unavailable three times that month. Others were unavailable a day or two.

Since then, Gloucester's record has improved. But a check of the handwritten log -- the system is not computerized -- shows Gloucester is routinely unavailable more than other departments. Gloucester reported zero availability six times in January and six times in December, in addition to not answering the daily check-in call another time. Danvers notched an unusual 18 zeros in December because one of its engines was being repaired, according to Fire Chief James Tutko.

Budget cuts and layoffs have strained many area fire departments. The squeeze has meant that departments routinely rely on neighboring towns, said Ronald Giovannacci, Topsfield Fire Chief and president of the Essex County Fire Chief's Association.

''Most of us cannot have a single house fire out here in the suburbs without depending on other towns," Giovannacci said. ''The sad thing is, sometimes you have to call mutual aid for a car fire because you can't get adequate manpower."

Giovannacci said the association's August letter to Gloucester was the first time in more than a decade the organization has notified a community that it is not meeting its mutual-aid obligations. He said the organization would not cut a community out of the mutual-aid system for its lack of availability. The letter, he said, was an attempt to encourage Gloucester to improve its track record because other communities are counting on its department.

In July, Gloucester started closing two of its four fire stations at least half of the time after voters rejected a tax increase to fully staff them. A Globe North report last Sunday showed that Gloucester had the slowest response time between 1986 and 2002 among 19 full-time fire departments in the region.

Gloucester Fire Chief Barry McKay said he told the mayor and the City Council about the letter during a September meeting, where leaders reviewed the Fire Department's closure of stations and firefighter layoffs.

''I discussed the mutual-aid issue but I think it went over everybody's head because most people don't understand mutual aid," McKay said.

While Gloucester has been more able to help its neighbors lately, McKay said it will likely rack up a lot of zeros again this summer, from June through August, when firefighters take vacations and the city is scraping by to protect its residents.

''When we hit the summer vacations, we will be, at best, 30 to 50 percent [available for mutual-aid calls], unless something changes like the city gives us more money," McKay said.

The problem is, summer is a tough time for many other area fire departments as their staffers also go on vacation.

''The entire mutual-aid system is being taxed," said Pierce, Beverly's chief. ''It's not just my cuts and Gloucester's cuts. The entire fire service has been hit pretty hard."

Budget cuts last year forced Beverly, for the first time, to say it could not provide a coveted ladder truck for mutual aid except during the winter. The ladder truck requires extra staffing. But the department still provides an engine for mutual aid.

Despite budget cuts regionwide, the Essex County Fire Chief's Association is poised to launch a major upgrade of its mutual-aid system, thanks to a $488,000 federal grant. Giovannacci, the association president, said the system, which covers 34 communities in the county, including 14 in Northern Essex, will finally be computerized. Once online, it will be able to instantly let dispatchers in the system's command centers know the availability of each piece of firefighting equipment in every department. It will also show them the closest available apparatus, helping to speed response times. The system is expected to go online in the next month or two, he said.

Kay Lazar can be reached at klazar@globe.com