Meyer responds to Rosston Council
Council Members and Mayor,
Thank you for giving us a chance to give you our side as volunteer fire fighters and first responders.
A great injustice has occurred.
Referring to the newspaper article that was printed in the paper on November the 16 , 2023 by the mayor of the City of Rosston, Ark So much so, that he had the article sent to the paper before he Relived the Fire chief of her duties in order for it to come out the very next day. Also. after he stated with witnesses that he had discussed it and cleared his actions with you the council members in the November 13th council meeting to relieve the chief of the Rosston Volunteer fire Department of her duties. The minutes from November 16 showed otherwise. The mayor never told the chief why he was reliving her of her duties other than a couple volunteer s were complaing of how she was running the department. As you all know by now our fire department was robbed not once but twice! Camera’s were installed in the fire station, one on the outside front door and one on the outside back door of the office into the fire department office area. The other two cameras were installed inside the bay area to cover the trucks and back door to the bay. The fire chief in fact ask the mayors permission to install the camera and he told her yes that she could just not int the office. There were no cameras in the fire department office area period. The camera’s that were installed were not attached to any phones nor did they have the voice recognition installed, they were in fact connected to the tv in the office where you had to physically turn the tv on with the remote to look at any pictures taken. We were trying to protect the fire department from further theft . that was our only intent. The key code lock on the door to the bay was given to all the certified fire fighters. The only fire fighters who did not get the code was the uncertified fire fighters. The intent was to cut down on the traffic into the bay where the trucks and tools were and to protect the volunteers from unwarranted accusations from the mayor whom blamed the volunteers for the theft to the fire chief herself. Also if the mayor had wanted the code to the door all that was needed was to ask for it since the fire chief was also trying to protect him from any blame. Yet, I cannot imagine how any of that justifies disbanding an entire fire department by changing all locks on fire house with no warning to any of us before noon on the very day he relieved the fire chief of her duties.
Whether the mayors actions were something akin to an adolescent tantrum or a publicity stunt matters not! His actions were reckless and leave vulnerable those he’s charged with protecting.
Yet, there are some lines that you do not cross. Endangering the public is clearly one of those lines.
Perhaps its residents need to remind its Mayor of that core value.