Vote no on 4A

High Timber Times
Dolan objects to ruling that he should repay pension payments

By Deb Hurley Brobst
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 at 10:44 am (Updated: April 17, 11:04 am)

Former Elk Creek fire chief Bill Dolan has filed a formal objection to the determination by a hearing officer with the Fire & Police Pension Association of Colorado that he be required to repay almost $44,000 in disability benefits he received beginning in August 2010 retroactive to May 2009.

The Flume

Pension board seeks repayment from Dolan; alleges fraud

Former Elk Creek Fire Chief Bill Dolan is being investigated by his pension association after it alleged in a May 19 letter that his disability benefits were fraudulently obtained.

The Fire and Police Pension Association of Colorado, an association created by state statute that manages retirement funds for police officers and firefighters in Colorado, will make its case against Dolan in an Aug. 23 administrative hearing, said Kevin Lindahl, the FPPA attorney. If an administrative officer finds that Dolan fraudulently received disability benefits totaling $43,949.44, he could be required to pay it back.

Lindahl said the hearing isn't a criminal one, and that Dolan wasn't being charged with any criminal activity by FPPA. He said Dolan could be represented by an attorney at the administrative hearing.
Dolan's disability benefit has been suspended until a determination is made at the hearing, said the FPPA letter.

Dolan didn't return phone calls seeking comment.

The FPPA alleges in its letter: "Mr. Dolan knowingly and fraudulently mislead FPPA Staff and the Hearing Officer on questions material to the outcome of the hearing by providing misinfomation or incomplete information when responding to questions raised at hearing relating to Mr. Dolan's fire service experience, employment and job duties in an effort to secure a disability benefit."

Further, it states, "The [Elk Creek Fire Protection District] has established a pattern of violating laws to benefit Mr. Dolan financially."

Examples of those alleged violations include granting volunteer service credit for time that Mr. Dolan was a paid fire chief, for not properly enrolling Dolan in the Statewide Defined Benefit Plan and Statewide Death and Disability Plan as the District's paid full-time Fire Chief, enrolling Dolan in Social Security contrary to requirements under state law, and by providing a written statement that stated Dolan did not respond to fire calls as part of the district's fire protection activities when the district's records showed otherwise.

Dolan started receiving disability benefits on Aug. 6, 2010, for an injury he suffered while on duty working for North Metro Fire Rescue. The payments were made retroactive to May 30, 2009, the day after Dolan resigned from North Metro.

Lindahl said the benefit paid to Dolan was 50 percent of his salary at North Metro Fire Rescue.
Dolan was a volunteer fire chief at Elk Creek from November 2008 until May 2010, when he was hired as the paid fire chief.

Soon after his hiring, an FPPA official contacted him about violating the terms of his disability agreement by working as a firefighter.

Dolan resigned from the paid position, but the Elk Creek Fire board wanted to keep him on in an administrative capacity.

At the time, Dolan said the board was working on creating a new position for him that would focus on the civilian duties of fire chief, while fire operations would be handled by a volunteer chief, Pete Igel.

But FPPA alleges that Dolan continued to be a first responder even after resigning, in violation of the terms of his disability.

"Even after Mr. Dolan's award of disability benefits, he continued to work as a full-time paid Fire Chief responding to fires and emergency incidents as a first-responder," said the May 19 letter from FPPA.

Dolan's actions were brought to FPPA's attention late last year by Mike Rogers, an Elk Creek Fire board member elected in May 2010.

Rogers told The Flume that the issue was first brought to his attention through anonymous complaints from volunteers who said they saw Dolan responding to fire calls, but Rogers couldn't act on the complaints because he didn't have proof.

Then he was provided with evidence, again from an anonymous source, in his district mail box. That evidence consisted of "blue sheets," or call logs, that showed Dolan had responded to emergency calls.

FPPA asked Dolan to explain himself during an April 26 meeting, but it said in the May 19 letter that Dolan wasn't forthcoming about information it obtained through dispatch records obtained from the fire district.

Those records indicated that Dolan was involved "in some way" with 129 incidents in 2009, and with 242 incidents in 2010, says the letter.

During the month that Dolan started receiving his disability benefits, Dolan responded to an Aug. 9, 2010, chimney fire in a tender truck, according to the FPPA letter. Then on Aug. 29, Dolan responded on scene to "three separate incidents," it says.

According to the FPPA letter, earlier dispatch records showed that Dolan responded to a forest and structure fire, multi-vehicle accidents, hazardous material calls, and others, sometimes driving Elk Creek Fire equipment.

During a July 27, 2010, meeting with the FPPA, Dolan made no mention of his activities with Elk Creek Fire, or that he even had been volunteering or that he was the paid fire chief for Elk Creek, until Lindahl directly asked him.

"Yes, I volunteered there and then in '09 they asked me to do their annual budget so I did that," Dolan said at the hearing, according to the FPPA letter. "And then in May of this year they offered me an administrative chief."

Dolan said his duties included managing the budget and the office. "No firefighting," he said.
When asked about responding to incidents, Dolan said he would only go out on calls as an observer and to take pictures.

When asked about the dispatch records, or "blue sheets," Dolan said those were the way for volunteers to get "volunteer credit for their volunteer pension."

"Contrary to Mr. Dolan's statement, the ECFPD records show that Mr. Dolan was the only responder or one of a small group of responders to certain incidents," said the FPPA letter. "It is not credible that he was only responding to take pictures."

Tim Biglen, the Elk Creek Fire board president, defended Dolan in an April 26 meeting with FPPA officials.

Regarding Elk Creek Fire's records indicating that Dolan went out on emergency calls, Biglen said they shouldn't be completely trusted.

"They are highly inaccurate," he said, according to the FPPA letter. "And that is because of the culture we have with our department. And it's been that way since I've been involved, since 2002."
He said that there tended to be many errors on the sheets.

"I would not want to defend them as a legal document in any sort of court case," he said.
In an emailed statement to The Flume, Biglen declined to explain what he meant, but he said he will explain at the next Elk Creek Fire board meeting, on July 14 at 6 p.m.

Biglen declined to answer questions about assertions that Dolan was acting as a first responder until after Dolan's FPPA hearing.

Regarding Biglen's suggestion that the records were inaccurate, Rogers said that wasn't true.
"Those records are 100 percent accurate," he said.

Rogers said he did his own investigation into the authenticity of the records by speaking to some of the volunteers about the calls they went on and the things they saw.

The records are filled out by the commander of each incident, or the chief. Office staff reviews the logs, and additions or subtractions can be made to the log, but the chief or incident commander then reviews the final copy and signs off on it.

Who deserves your trust?

A fire department that serves the community, and opens it's books to all interested parties (test it! walk in and say "I want to see your records." They'll hand em over).

Or a bunch of people who got kicked out of said department, and would do or say anything to make that department fail?

Somehow these angry people think if Elk Creek doesn't get the funding it needs. If it has trouble providing the services this community needs, that this some how vindicates them (twisted logic I know).

I've been reading this stuff for a month (i'm really sick of it), and I believe if you read between the lines, you'll find that these people could care less about the needs of the community. It's all about their vendetta against the department.

I am voting yes on 4A. I don't care what a bunch of hypocritical disgruntled ex-employees, convicted liars and thieves say (and yes, that's tax payer money they stoled).

Wow... I still didn't see anything but the word "allegations"... No: "convicted"s...no "guilty"s..... Just the usual venomous mud-slinging, pulled from the usual sphincters of the usual potty mouths and rumor-mongers...

Imagine my surprise...

DoublePlay wrote: Who deserves your trust?

A fire department that serves the community, and opens it's books to all interested parties (test it! walk in and say "I want to see your records." They'll hand em over).

Or a bunch of people who got kicked out of said department, and would do or say anything to make that department fail?

Somehow these angry people think if Elk Creek doesn't get the funding it needs. If it has trouble providing the services this community needs, that this some how vindicates them (twisted logic I know).

I've been reading this stuff for a month (i'm really sick of it), and I believe if you read between the lines, you'll find that these people could care less about the needs of the community. It's all about their vendetta against the department.

I am voting yes on 4A. I don't care what a bunch of hypocritical disgruntled ex-employees, convicted liars and thieves say (and yes, that's tax payer money they stoled).

Who deserves your trust? I certainly don't put any in what you say. I am not an ex employee, convicted liar or thief. Now prove to me that anyone who disagrees is an ex-employee, convicted liar or thief. With your logic you could be a disgruntled ex employee, convicted liar and thief.

The District has been mismanaged and continues in the same way with Chief McLaughlin leading the pack. Learn to balance a budget and live within it. Certainly the way the ballot question is worded you give him and the board a free check to do whatever they chose. Vote NO on 4A.

Pretty cool you know how to recite newspaper articles! May I point out the number of times those articles say "alleged" in them. I would challenge you to find a true conviction in any of those articles.

I would further challenge you to GET BACK ON TOPIC! This thread about the mill levy not about HTT article dredging.

There was a notation about the "error" in the Audit. Has the "corrected" audit been posted? Reading back over the "wrong" one and doing some simple math I can color between the lines and see that the actual overage in the budget is around 90K

Is there an explanation for over spending 90K?

Something I cant seem to cypher out of the audit is some payroll stuff. Can anyone explain or demonstrate the total amount budgeted for salary, benefits and overtime. not lumped together but each line. These amounts play an important roll when evaluating a combination department that is claiming to experience financial issues. Are there areas that the volunteer support could assist and reduce the overhead?

Was just on the Colorado Union of Taxpayers website and found a link about the 4A ballot issue. Interesting website with several pictures and links to information. ( I had received a mailer about CUT at my business a couple weeks back.)

truthatecfd.com

Dolan’s disability benefits terminated by FPPA board
Former Elk Creek Fire chief likely to appeal

Posted: Friday, August 3, 2012 4:10 pm | Updated: 3:06 pm, Fri Aug 10, 2012.

Mike Potter, Staff Writer | 0 comments

The Colorado Fire and Police Pension Association board voted on July 26 to uphold a hearing officer’s determination to terminate the disability benefits of former Elk Creek Fire Chief Bill Dolan and require him to repay the benefits he received after May 2010, when he was hired as the paid Elk Creek fire chief. That's roughly half of the $44,000 he received in disability benefits.
Dolan didn’t begin receiving benefits until August 2010, and those benefits were retroactive to May 2009.

Following the vote, Dolan’s attorney, Greenwood Village-based David Seserman said his client would likely appeal the decision to district court.

Seserman told The Flume that he and his client were prepared for the board to terminate Dolan’s disability benefits.

“We certainly weren’t surprised by the outcome,” he said.
Dolan declined to comment.

CORRECTED: This story has been corrected to indicate that Dolan will be required to repay roughly half of the $44,000 in disability benefits he received from the FPPA.

That's not an "allegation" that's a "conviction."

Looks like the ex-chief has about 44,000 reasons to hate Elk Creek.

Maybe instead of sitting at his computer posting lies and twisted logic all day, he should go and get a job so he can repay some of that tax payer money he was convicted of stealing.

If he and his friends will perjure themselves under oath in a court of law, why would you think they'd tell you the truth?

KINCAIDSPRINGS wrote: I would further challenge you to GET BACK ON TOPIC! This thread about the mill levy not about HTT article dredging.

Forgive me *****, but listening to what someone says is just one step in the process of understanding. In order to truly understand a statement, it is important to understand the motivation of the speaker. I'm sorry if all this, "why did he say that," is getting in the way of all your, "just listen to what I say and don't ask why."