MANCHESTER — Residents expressed concerns about the town’s volunteer fire department and its suspended full-time fire chief for more than an hour Tuesday during the Select Board meeting’s public comment period.

Manchester Fire Chief Francis R. Wozniak Andy Molloy/Kennebec Journal file

Sixteen residents showed up to the meeting, many with strong feelings about the performance of Manchester Fire Chief Francis R. Wozniak, who was put on paid administrative leave June 28 after being charged with impersonating a public official.

“I’m just so disappointed that, literally 35 years after I joined the Manchester Fire Department, I have to sit here and listen to these issues about the fire department,” former volunteer firefighter and budget committee member Joshua Black said.

In June, Wozniak was issued a summons by the Hallowell Police Department after authorities said he installed blue lights on his town-owned pickup truck and identified himself as a “constable,” a law enforcement position that does not exist in Manchester. Use of blue lights is reserved for law enforcement officers.

According to a March invoice, the Manchester Fire Department spent $13,561.02 on red and blue lights, sirens, other equipment and installation. The cost for the lights alone was more than $5,000, and installation of the equipment on Wozniak’s town-owned 2021 Dodge Ram cost $4,600.

Residents had complaints about the fire department’s manpower and equipment being used in nonemergency situations, as well as a lack of training for firefighters, questionable expenses and an absence of proper fire department records.

Wozniak was not at the meeting. He has been the town’s only full-time fire chief since the position was created in 2019. In 2020, he was arrested on a charge of drunken driving in Portland and pleaded guilty.

Residents asked Town Manager Debora Southiere and members of the Select Board several times how long Wozniak’s leave would last and how long he would continue to be paid his $59,325 salary, but no clear answer was given by the board or town manager.

Robert Gasper, one of the selectmen and a longtime volunteer firefighter, fielded most of the questions and comments from residents. He often defended the fire department and Wozniak. Many exchanges with Gasper were tense.

In response to one question from a resident, Gasper said the department was well prepared for a scheduled inspection from the Maine Bureau of Labor Standards. Behind him, Southiere held up several folders of paperwork and said she had to cancel the inspection because, according to her records, the department was not ready and would have been fined if the inspection went forward. Gasper later said he was “not sure” if Southiere had a “complete record of what was being prepared for BLS.”

Gasper also had several tense exchanges with Black, the former firefighter, who pressed Gasper repeatedly on the operations of the fire department.

“Bob (Gasper), if you think the fire department’s getting picked on, I got news for you: The fire department is the only thing that my tax dollars go to, besides the school budget and you guys,” Black said. “So what else are we going to complain about?”

The fire department makes up the third-largest set of expenses for Manchester at more than $195,000, behind only town employee compensation and road maintenance. Manchester also pays $4.7 million to the Regional School Unit 38 budget.

Southiere said she is discussing action on Wozniak’s future with the town’s attorney, and that she hopes to make a final decision in the next several days after discussing her choice with the Select Board. She said she could not comment on the conditions for Wozniak to be recalled from his administrative leave.

Though she initially wanted to avoid appointing a stand-in for Wozniak because she did not know how long Wozniak’s suspension would last, Southiere said she plans to soon appoint longtime volunteer firefighter Walter Mooers as acting chief. Southiere and Mooers will undergo training to prepare for the BLS investigation in the coming weeks.

Mooers, who is currently paid $25 per hour as a volunteer firefighter, will be paid in his role as acting chief an as-yet-undetermined rate through the town’s part-time firefighter pay fund, Southiere said.