By DAN CROWLEY
Staff Writer
Daily Hampshire Gazette
WORTHINGTON — A year after first requesting an inventory of federal surplus property obtained by the town’s Fire Department, the Select Board still does not have a complete list of that equipment.
After verbally requesting the inventory from the state without success, the Select Board last week sent a written public records request to Jack Murray, commissioner of the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, seeking an inventory of all federal surplus equipment Worthington has received under the Department of Defense Firefighter Property Program (FFP) during the past 10 years.
The equipment has apparently been obtained by the Worthington Fire-Rescue Association, a nonprofit group run by the town’s firefighters. The Department of Conservation and Recreation coordinates the program, along with another one called the Federal Excess Personal Property Program (FEPP) that Worthington’s firefighters also use.
An inventory of the equipment obtained under the FEPP program was provided by the Department of Conservation and Recreation to the Select Board in February.
The board’s request last week follows a similar public records request made by the Gazette to the Department of Conservation and Recreation nearly a month ago and which has not yet been fulfilled.
“You almost wonder, is it that they don’t know, or they just don’t want to tell you?” Select Board Chairman Christopher K. Powell said of the record keepers.
The inventory is critical for Powell to gain a fuller understanding of the federal and military surplus property in town and whether and how that equipment — most often wheeled vehicles — is stored, fueled, maintained, disposed of and used. It also would provide clues as to whether any of that equipment has left the town and under what circumstances.
At times, some of the federal surplus equipment has had state-issued blue license plates, raising liability questions for the town and blurring the lines between public and private ownership, according to Powell. At other times, some surplus property has been seen for sale on private property, he said.
“Certain pieces of equipment have liabilities associated with them,” Powell said.
The state attorney general is investigating the use of military and federal surplus property by Worthington firefighters after Powell sought outside assistance last year. Regardless of the outcome of that probe, the Select Board still wants the inventory list.
“We ought to have a list, we felt, even if the attorney general has one,” Powell said. “We have a rough idea of the things that we had seen, but it was pretty much obvious. They were things that we knew were there.”
In letters from the Select Board to former fire chief Richard Granger and the Worthington Fire-Rescue Association dated March 10, 2014, board members sought detailed information regarding the existence of federal surplus property in town, including applications, inventory records, and acquisition paperwork such as titles and transfers. They sought a listing of all state-issued license plates and all town equipment in possession of the Fire Department with copies of registrations and titles.
In addition, the Select Board wanted a listing of all vehicles previously owned by the town and disposed of by the Fire Department, whether through resale or scrapping, with related documents such as title transfers, purchase or scrap prices and fund transfer forms.
The Select Board wanted the information by March 24, 2014, and ordered the Fire Department to seek authorization from the Select Board before making any future acquisitions of federal surplus property or disposing of any town-owned equipment.
The information was not forthcoming. In a letter dated March 25, 2014, to the Select Board, former assistant fire chief Rick Scott wrote that while the board was within its rights to request an inventory of town-owned vehicles and state-issued blue plates, other information it sought from the Worthington Fire-Rescue Association did not fall within its purview.
In his seven-page letter, Scott wrote that the Fire Department would “welcome the chance to sit down with the board to resolve questions and differences” and that, “This discussion must happen outside of the construct of an open board meeting and must be approached by both sides with an attitude of mutual respect and open-mindedness.”
Scott closed his letter by stating that he was “offended” by the board’s letters, which he perceived to be “filled with contempt and enmity toward Worthington’s emergency responders.”
Granger and Scott, who served as the town’s emergency manager director, resigned from the Fire Department last month. Five other firefighters resigned less than a week later, including Scott’s wife, and Granger’s two sons and father.
The inventory of equipment from the FEPP programs provided to the Select Board in February listed two trailers, a snowmobile, a 2½-ton truck, backhoe and trailer/compressor.
State officials were in Worthington earlier this month conducting an on-site inventory of that property, according to town officials. They were accompanied by Select Board member Evan Johnson, according to Powell. Johnson was out of state last week and could not be reached for comment.
Under the FEPP program, the surplus equipment comes from a variety of federal agencies and can be used by a community for as long as it needs it, although it remains the property of the federal government.
“It never comes out of ownership unless nobody wants it,” state Fire Chief Warden David Celino said. “We put it through a disposal process.”
The federal surplus inventory in question in Worthington is under the FFP program, which is typically all military equipment that comes from the Department of Defense. As Celino explained it, recipients of this property have a year to put it into service and must keep using it for one year before gaining title to the property.
“They take ownership of it,” Celino said.
Celino said the state Department of Conservation and Recreation maintains the inventories as part of a national database. The state agency has to account for inventories every two years, conducts on-site visits, and every five years goes through an audit.
“We have a good, solid accountability system in place,” Celino said. “We like to see how the equipment is being used.”
Dan Crowley can be reached at [email protected].
