SPECTRUM: Eastman’s record as a firefighter is concerning

This election year has taught me the importance of looking into candidates and their claims. We owe it to ourselves to look into the people who want to represent us, and something stood out to me about a candidate for House District 10. David Eastman listed his career as “Firefighter/EMT,” a career that requires many of the same qualities I would want in an elected representative - dedication, integrity, and selflessness.

Firefighters are especially near and dear to my heart since I have friends and family members who serve as Emergency Responders and have witnessed firsthand their commitment and sacrifice. Last year, my home was nearly destroyed by the Sockeye Wildfire and the dedication of the responders was key to keeping my home and many others’ safe.

This is exactly why I cannot stand idly by while someone tarnishes hard won reputations by using the title of firefighter for personal gain. I hope my perspective can offer some insights and explain exactly why this is a critical issue for voters in District 10 to consider.

David Eastman, the “career firefighter”, started working with Central Mat Su Fire Department in March of 2015 and, according to department records, has since only responded to 6 of the estimated 2000 emergencies reported within that timeframe. During this time, taxpayers picked up the tab for 628 hours of his training.

If every volunteer firefighter sported a record like this, it would be a burden on both the department, and the budget for staffing. The information about his service is available to anyone who is willing to file the information request with the Mat-Su Borough office, thanks to the Freedom of Information Act.

It is not unheard of for eager firefighters from the lower 48 to come up to Alaska for training, since not only do they not have to pay for the qualification-building training, but they are actually compensated for their time. This is a testament to a constant need for quality responders, and those who take advantage of it for the qualifications are rightfully frowned upon.

Fully aware of what it looks like when someone has signed up to take advantage of the generosity of our stations, his entire record makes it clear he does not appear to be planning to use his training to serve his community. It needs to be said, training to be a firefighter and exhibiting the character of one are not the same.

Thanks to the dedication and sacrifice of my sister, a firefighter in Willow, I am well aware of the policies surrounding how many hours a firefighter can work and train each week. Since Mr. Eastman is a paid on-call volunteer and not a full-time firefighter he would be limited to 29.9 hours of training and work in a given work week. In my sister’s department, these limits are occasionally a frustration as the responders try to balance keeping up with training requirements while keeping hours “open” for the unknown number of calls that might come in.

But it is NOT the cap on hours that keeps Mr. Eastman from responding to emergencies. He is merely averaging 7½ hours of training per week. That leaves over 22 hours for him to respond to actual fire or rescue calls. So if it is not an hours cap that is holding him back, what is? His low attendance has been a pattern since he joined the Central Mat-Su Fire Department.

Furthermore, of the six calls he has actually attended, four of them occurred when he was either in training or in the station on call, which means he only actually responded to two calls on his own time.

Is his low response rate due to other employment that conflicts with rescue calls? From looking at the rest of his resume in the Official Elections Pamphlet, his website, and other publicly available sources such as LinkedIn, it appears that Mr. Eastman has not held a full-time job since he left his position with the State of Alaska in September 2015.

As we head to November 8th, I am left with more questions about Mr. Eastman than answers. The pattern of his record suggests that he desires the prestige of being called a firefighter more than the responsibility of putting in the hard work to be a true public servant that protects the people of the Mat-Su Valley. I am not confident that he is the type of representative that we want in Juneau to speak for us.

I want to be clear that this is not an attack on firefighters, but about the misrepresentation of a candidate to the public, a man wearing the title of hero as a cloak to hide the qualities of character he clearly does not possess. In my view, the David Eastman I see in this record is unworthy of representing his department, emergency responders, or any of us in District 10.

Talon Boeve is a resident of Willow.