Special Meeting on Firefighter’s Contract Could Curtail Councilor’s Questions

WARWICK, RI— Constables visited city councillors Wednesday to inform them a special meeting to ratify the firefighter’s contract had been called for Friday, except for Jeremy Rix, who was on a JetBlue flight, under the impression the topic would wait till Jan. 7.

“I am literally on a plane. Will land in a few hours,” Rix messaged at about 1 p.m. that day.

“It’s unfortunate that [Rix] won’t be there for the meeting on Friday,” said Councilman Timothy Howe, who said he organized the vote to call the special session after Monday’s marathon meeting. The full council meeting, which was supposed to have started at 7 p.m., didn’t start till nearly midnight due to a long-running Finance Committee meeting stretched out by public comment and questions from Finance Committee members Councilors Ed Ladouceur, Stephen McAllister and Howe.

Howe said he was frustrated that debate and a vote on the contract might needlessly stretch over multiple meetings in a similar manner, a process he said he’d witnessed over the summer. City business would unnecessarily pile up and limit the council’s time to address the contract then, he said.

Rix, writing from his holiday destination, said there’s little reason for concern about the workload facing the council in the immediate future, even given the backlog from the largely unrealized Dec. 16 agenda.

“The public hearing portions of all matters before the Council, including the contract, were held and concluded. That’s the time-intensive part of these meetings. The dockets for the December 16 and January 6 meetings are relatively light. Even if the Council does spend another 2 or 3 hours debating the Contract on January 6, there shouldn’t be any problem with finishing the meeting and holding the vote at that time. In the meantime, I still haven’t gotten answers to questions that were asked at the last meeting,” Rix said.

Councilman Anthony Sinapi, who also voted to hold the special meeting, said he has lingering questions of his own about the contract. The special meeting will likely provide another three hours of questions for him and other councilors to explore their concerns.

Sinapi said he agreed with Howe that Monday’s finance committee meeting shouldn’t have been allowed to crowd out the council’s regular meeting.

“I don’t want that to happen again,” Sinapi said.

Both Howe and Sinapi noted the contract has been available for the council’s review since November. That should have given their fellow council members time to familiarize themselves with the contract, limiting the time needed for review during the finance committee meeting, Howe said.

Nonetheless, Rix said, despite the use of constables, the surprise special meeting now leaves him out of the continuing debate.

“I am unclear on how this meeting was scheduled and hopeful that a vote will not be held until I return,” Rix wrote during his plane trip.