PEORIA, Ill. — For the second time in as many weeks, protesters on Saturday took to the corner of Allen and Wilhelm Rds. to voice displeasure over the scheduled decommissioning of Peoria Fire Department engines four and 20.
The Sept. 1 decision by the city council came after months of deliberation over restructuring the fiscal year 2021 budget because of COVID-19.
The decommissioning of the engines will lead to the shuttering of their respective stations.
“It doesn’t make sense why we are putting our fire stations and our safety on the line for whatever sort of political game or political motivations there are,” said organizer Jillian O’Dell.
“I don’t know what those motivations are, but I do know our fire stations and our safety should be number one priority of our leaders.”
Belief about prioritization was also Northside resident Srikanth Gadeela’s reason for protesting.
“I’m really upset they’re able to fund the Civic Center, but not able to find money for public safety, which should be the priority,” he said.
“This is the fastest-growing neighborhood in Peoria, and Fire Station 20 is the only fire station that can address public safety here.
“Every minute counts in the case of emergency so, without Fire Station 20, we lose the crucial early minutes, and I’m here to protest it.”
Both Gadeela and O’Dell said they’ve attempted to take their grievances to city leaders, to little or no avail.
“I just want to say to the city council as a whole, I’ve sent an e-mail to Mayor Jim Ardis and [Councilman Denis] Cyr, but I haven’t even seen just a courtesy e-mail,” Gadeela said.
“Based on what I’ve seen so far, I don’t think they care about us.”
O’Dell said she has reached out via e-mail to Ardis and all council members and has invited them all to both protests that have taken place.
“The only councilman I’ve heard back from is Councilman [Chuck] Grayeb, and he said he supports our movement. We do appreciate that support,” she said.
“That being said, he is still on our city council, and I think not only he, but everybody else on city council could be doing a lot more.”
A development on Friday revealed the City of Peoria and Local 50, the firefighters’ union, have been negotiating a deal that would involve the union’s dropping of a $500,000 unfair labor practice lawsuit against the city.
In exchange, the city would only decommission one of the two engines scheduled for the chopping block.
However, O’Dell called that deal a Band-Aid solution, because the engine not immediately decommissioned would only be guaranteed to keep running through March 31, 2021.
The city did not specify in its statement which engine would be spared, however temporarily it might be spared.
Gadeela said if the protests don’t force a permanent change in the city’s plans, he’ll take his voice to the ballot box.
“I would recommend everybody to take a hard look at what’s going on, and please vote in the upcoming election [in April],” he said.
O’Dell said she hasn’t given up hope the protests will work.
“I plan on doing this until we can get both stations open permanently,” said O’Dell.
“That’s the only acceptable resolution.”
In a text message follow-up to WMBD News, Cyr said there was “lots of work left to do.”
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