“We are not going to allow this administration to force the union down our throats!”
Thus was the response of Addington Stewart, chairman of F.I.R.E., to an alleged “Memorandum of Understanding” blasted to the media by Director of Public Safety Charles Bryson on the eve of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend.
Though some mainstream and even minority media covered Bryson’s claims as news, it had no basis in fact. F.I.R.E., which represents the vast majority of black firefighters in the St. Louis Fire Department, has reached no new understanding with the City of St. Louis or Local 73, the white-dominated firefighters’ union.
In fact, for Stewart and the other members of F.I.R.E., Bryson’s attempt at media manipulation on behalf of the City – just before a holiday weekend when Mayor Francis G. Slay was bracing himself for public opposition – was business as usual.
“We feel it is disingenuous for us to receive a document that is sent to the media at the same time it is sent to F.I.R.E.,” Stewart said.
“This, unfortunately, is how the union and the City has operated for years, and this is one of the reasons why we have remained outside of the union and can’t trust the union or the City, which clearly advocates for the union.”
Stewart said Bryson’s gesture, which F.I.R.E. assumed to be approved by the mayor’s office, was a major setback in any attempt by the City or Local 73 to work constructively with F.I.R.E.
He also criticized the way the matter was handled, with rank-and-file members of F.I.R.E. receiving details of the memorandum at the same time as F.I.R.E.’s leadership.
Stewart said, “F.I.R.E. feels that this is an attack on our organization by bypassing the Executive Board of F.I.R.E., and these are the same tactics that the local has used to try to divide our organization by addressing our membership directly.”
Stewart said this move by the City fits the pattern established in the approach to former Fire Chief Sherman George’s resistance to making contested promotions from the 2004 testing list.
“This media play is the same thing that they did with Chief George by attempting to sway public opinion before they allowed him time to review or respond to their agenda,” Stewart said.
George was demoted by Bryson and Slay. He then retired from the department and sued the City for racial discrimination and illegal job action. He remains the central figure in a movement to force Slay into greater power-sharing with the black community, to avoid future disasters such as the promotion of Bryson for the purpose of demoting the City’s first black fire chief.
Bryson did not send the Memo of Understanding to the St. Louis American. Both he and mayoral spokesman Ed Rhode have indicated they have no further comment to readers of the St. Louis American.