Florida Town Asks USMC to Release Lieutenant from Active Duty Service

Citing an undue hardship on the department, Palm Beach Fire-Rescue is asking the U.S. Marines to release firefighter Lt. Rob Locy from active duty.

The absence of Locy, a gunnery sergeant, has forced other employees to take on extra work and has strained the department with an “excessive amount of overtime costs,” Deputy Fire Chief Darrel Donatto wrote in a memo to the town’s assistant director of human resources.

Locy, who was the department’s Firefighter of the Year in 2008, hasbeen deployed since Jan. 1, 2011, and has been on continuous active duty since Nov. 1, 2011, serving stateside. In July, the town received military orders that Locy will be deployed through Sept.30 .

Fire-Rescue has paid 2,424 hours of overtime to cover Locy’s vacancy, the memo said. It does not provide the monetary cost for those hours.

Donatto estimated the cost at about $90,000 based on an average hourly overtime rate of $38.01. He said he couldn’t provide an “actual cost” because it would have to be calculated based on the salary of each person who covered each of the 101 24-four hour overtime shifts.

Locy’s absence has resulted in increased stress on “his overburdened and overworked co-workers,” Donatto wrote in the memo. Several times, other employees had to work mandatory overtime to cover for Locy because no one volunteered.

The department has fewer firefighters on staff than in previousyears because the town has eliminated eight firefighter positions since 2011 to save money. The remaining firefighters’ work hours per week have increased as have the town’s overtime costs.

But Town Manager Peter Elwell said calling Locy back to Fire-Rescue has nothing to do with the downsizing of the department. It’s about the more than $200,000 in salary and overtime it has cost taxpayersto have Locy deployed for 2 1/2 years, he said.

Elwell said the town’s “generous” military leave policy was meantfor short periods of time, not for years.

“We’re holding his position,” Elwell said. “It’s not a vacant position. Even if we had not reduced staff in the fire department, we would still ask Lt. Locy to return to the town. The impact to the town has become excessive. We’re not suggesting that he’s not providing valuable service to the military. Lt. Locy is an effective leader, and we need his leadership in the fire department.”

In a Sept. 12 letter to Locy’s commanding officer, the town requested Locy’s military obligation be canceled or postponed so he can return to Fire-Rescue.

“Lt. Locy is a supervisor with special training and experience needed to fill the role to which he is assigned,” Donatto wrote in the attached memo. “There are limited numbers of other employees who can step-up into his role thus creating an undue hardship onthe department in making sure that a supervisor is covering his assignment.”

Locy declined comment, citing a department policy prohibiting firefighters from speaking to the media without approval.

Locy was paid $79,251 by the military last year and is approved for the same salary from last Tuesday through Sept. 30, 2014, accordingto his July 26 orders from the Marine Forces Reserve. Locy’s pay from the town during his entire deployment is $94,557.39, according to town records.

While employees are deployed, the town pays their full salaries fo rthe first 30 days of each year. After that, the town pays the difference between his military base salary and the town’s base salary.

Locy annual salary with the town is about $88,132 annually,according to human resources.

When the town hired Locy in March 1997, he had already been serving in the Marine Reserves for three years. In 2007, Locy served in combat in Iraq for seven months, conducting counterinsurgency operations in the Anbar Province.

Locy currently serves with the Wounded Warrior Regiment as a district injured support coordinator for Florida, helping Marineswho are injured or get sick in the line of duty.

— mdargan@ pbdailynews.com