Oct. 10—Londonderry's town manager took issue this week with comments the fire chief made in submitting his resignation Monday over budget issues.
At Monday's Town Council meeting, Chief James "Bo" Butler told town officials he would resign due to issues with his department's budget and what the town administration was asking him to do to keep his costs down.
The council took no action on the resignation.
Late Tuesday, Town Manager Michael Malaguti responded to Butler's resignation with his own statement, saying many comments made at Monday's meeting were incorrect.
Butler said budget demands made by the town's administration put him in a "moral and ethical dilemma of the first order."
Malaguti said since Butler was appointed fire chief just over a year ago, he has provided him with the "highest level of guidance, direction, coaching and support and have marshaled other resources to support him."
Malaguti added details of how he and the Town Council have supported significant fire department funding requests:
"Residents of Londonderry should know that contrary to what was portrayed last night, the Town Council and I have supported more than $5 million in new funding for the fire department since I took office in February 2022 — an average of $163,734 per month."
Butler told the council he was advised as budget season gets underway to make do with less staff, even though voters at the polls in March approved a measure to add new firefighters to the department, bringing the number to 13 staff members each in four battalions.
He said he would not give the order to eliminate any services.
"I won't come under budget at the cost of (residents') safety," Butler said. "So it's not that I can't give the order to drop services, but I won't give the order."
Malaguti challenged the firefighters union's claim that he "mandated that Chief Butler reduce staff from 13 to 11 members per shift."
He said neither he nor the town's finance director ever made that demand. "Instead, we informed the chief that his overtime budget is trending $200,000 over budget just one quarter into the fiscal year and we answered the Chief's questions about possible strategies to address this trend," his statement read.
"We will continue to support Londonderry Fire Department as careful stewards of the taxpayers' money that has been entrusted to our care," Malaguti wrote.
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