Posted: Jul 20, 2010 at 4:33 PM [Today]

A chemical substance was discovered floating on the Huron River near the University of Michigan's Nichols Arboretum on Monday evening, officials said.

A passerby noticed a sheen on the surface of the water around 7:30 p.m. and immediately reported it to the Ann Arbor Fire Department, said Ann Arbor Water Quality Manager Molly Wade.

U-M's Occupational Safety and Environmental Health and police also responded to the scene.

According to reports, the discharge was coming from some sort of manhole near the river.

The discharge was stopped, and booms were placed in the water to collect as much of the chemical out of the river as possible before heavy rains came through Monday evening.

Samples were taken to determine what the substance was, but results have not yet been returned, said Diane Brown, spokeswoman for the U-M Department of Public Safety.

Tina Reed covers health and the environment for AnnArbor.com.

Ann Arbor firefighter Tilvis Bolen gathers his belongings from a ladder truck at the fire department's headquarters downtown after returning from a call on Wednesday. He says he's sad to see four of his peers lose their jobs.

Ryan J. Stanton | AnnArbor.com

Four Ann Arbor Fire Department employees finished their last day on the job this week, the latest casualties of the city's budget struggles.

Those being laid off include three firefighters and one management assistant, said Fire Chief Dominick Lanza, who declined further comment.

The hats of three firefighters who were facing layoff earlier this year sat on a truck at Station 4 in Ann Arbor in January.

City officials were hoping to avoid implementing layoffs, but their plan counted on other firefighters retiring by July 1.

Mayor John Hieftje expressed regret that the last day of the city's fiscal year came and went on Wednesday without any of the city's seven retirement-eligible firefighters hanging up their hats.

"My heart goes out to the folks who are being laid off," Hieftje said. "But again, these are unprecedented times in our state, and I don't think there's a city left that hasn't had to make painful decisions."

The Ann Arbor City Council approved a budget in May for the new fiscal year, which starts today. The budget includes trimming five vacant positions in the police department and five jobs in the fire department, only one of which was vacant.

City Administrator Roger Fraser said the fire department is the only department to see layoffs, although a significant number of vacant positions are being eliminated throughout the city.

Early in the budget process, 40 jobs in police and fire had been slated for elimination. But after revisions by Hieftje and council members, only five were cut in each department — with the hope that layoffs would be avoided through firefighter retirements.

Hieftje said 12 firefighters in Grand Rapids recently retired to save the jobs of younger firefighters facing layoff there.

But in Ann Arbor, fire officials acknowledged back in May they were unsure whether those eligible would retire because no financial incentive was offered.

"That's a personal decision that they have to make, and currently there's not an incentive to do that," Lanza said at the time. "The city's not in a financial posture to do a buyout like they did with the police officers."

Hieftje argues there was enough incentive.

Hieftje said the firefighters eligible to retire could have left the city with more than $100,000 cash in their pockets, their full pensions and retiree health insurance. He said each had more than $100,000 banked from unused sick days and vacation time over the courses of their careers and will receive that money as a cash payout when they retire.

"When we talk about incentives, it's hard for me to understand why any additional incentive would be needed," he said.

Representatives of the Ann Arbor firefighters union did not return phone calls seeking comment Wednesday.

Hieftje said the city has taken steps in recent years to cut down on those kinds of large cash payouts. In the 1980s and '90s, employees could walk out the door with a couple hundred thousand dollars or more when they retired, but that's no longer the case, he said.

A New York Times story Sunday looked at the issue on a national level, pointing out how one New Jersey town paid out nearly $1 million to four retiring police officers for their unused sick days and vacation time.

Lanza said in May that eliminating five positions in the fire department would be manageable. He said no fire stations would close, and the city still would be able to get firefighters on the scene of a fire as quickly as it does today.

But the firefighters union has disagreed with the chief, claiming the department already is substandard. Lanza declined to comment on Wednesday when asked if he still believes response times wouldn't diminish.

Hieftje said the layoff of firefighters is a first.

"So far as I know, I don't think the city has ever laid off any firefighters — at least not in modern times," he said. "But these are unprecedented times and the worst situation for government funding since the 1930s."

Ryan J. Stanton covers government and politics for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at ryanstanton@annarbor.com or 734-623-2529.

Posted: Jun 24, 2010 at 9:02 PM [Yesterday]

A woman in the 100 block of Kenwood Avenue suffered burns this evening after a pot full of cooking grease and towels caught fire, according to a press release from the Ann Arbor Fire Department.

Firefighters arrived on the scene at about 6 p.m. to find a fire on the back porch where the pot was burning. A husband and wife living at the home were heating the grease on the stove when it caught fire, according to the release. They tried to put out the fire by throwing towels on the burning grease; when it was not extinguished the woman took the pot out to the porch.

The woman received burns on her chest, arms and legs and was taken to University of Michigan hospital for treatment. Further information on her condition was not immediately available.

There was minor damage reported in the kitchen and the porch.

A fire that started in the chimney of a bread-baking oven damaged the bakery at the Ypsilanti Food Co-op early this morning.

No one was injured, but the bakery at 308 River St. in Ypsilanti will be closed while the damage is assessed and necessary repairs are made. The co-op itself will remain open, said co-op manager Corinne Sikorski, who is also one of the building owners.

An employee riding to work on a bicycle saw smoke coming from around the chimney and called 911, Sikorski said. The employee and the co-op's baker then alerted the tenants in the apartment above, who got out safely.

Ypsilanti Fire Capt. Dan Cain said 10 Ypsilanti firefighters, as well as three from Ann Arbor, fought the blaze and had it under control within about 40 minutes of receiving the call at 4:35 a.m. He said smoke and flames were visible from the back of the building when firefighters arrived.

Cain estimated damage at $15,000. He said damage was mostly contained to the bakery area.

Sikorski said the co-op had torn down the original brick wood-burning oven built in 1989 and rebuilt it. Employees were in the process of starting up the new oven when something malfunctioned.