Photo by Solomon Crenshaw Jr.
Homewood Fire Engine No. 1.
The city of Homewood is weighing its potential involvement in an antitrust class-action lawsuit regarding fire engine price-fixing.
The national litigation names the nation’s top three manufacturers — REV Group, Oshkosh Corp. (including Pierce Manufacturing) and Rosenbauer America — and the Fire Apparatus Manufacturers’ Association as defendants. The lawsuits allege the three manufacturers control 70% to 80% of the nation’s fire truck market.
The allegation is that the manufacturers and their association conspired to suppress the supply of fire trucks and raise the prices of trucks sold throughout the United States.
More than 60 lawsuits have been filed by cities, counties and other entities that buy fire trucks across the country, and cases are being consolidated in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, where the first lawsuit was filed last year.
“The council has voted for us to explore our options,” Homewood Fire Chief Brandon Broadhead said. “I would assume that our attorneys will come back and give them ... this is what we think we should do.”
Broadhead said the case involves multiple fire engines purchased by the city.
“It goes all the way back to 2016,” he said. “Every truck we have purchased since 2016 is being reviewed to try to determine if the price was correct or artificially elevated.”
“The lawsuit alleges that the big fire truck manufacturers colluded to fix the price,” the chief continued. “We are just exploring whether we are involved in that or not at this point. If the courts agree that the allegations are true, then I would suspect we are involved because we have bought them. But at this point, they’re getting our data and determining, would we qualify?”
Broadhead said the city has bought four fire engines since 2016. Each came from one of the manufacturers that are alleged to have fixed prices.
The city of Milwaukee filed the first lawsuit against the manufacturers. The suit alleges that the defendants’ conduct to consolidate the market, charge supracompetitive prices and create a backlog in the delivery of new fire apparatuses has diminished the availability of fire trucks, impairing firefighters’ ability to respond effectively and leaving the public less protected during fires and other emergencies.
Broadhead said the suit has prompted a hearing in the U.S. Senate.
“The International Association of Fire Fighters actually made a big presentation about it,” he said. “There’s a ton of information out there as far as how it started. It just now came to Homewood to decide if we want to explore being a part of it or not.”
At least three cities in Alabama have officially gotten involved, including Chelsea, Guntersville and Muscle Shoals.
