Employee Spotlight

Paul Birk

On Monday, February 28th, northeast Ohio had over two inches of rain fall in a short amount of time. A number of municipalities had to deal with mass amounts of flooding which demanded the attention of safety officials. For the City of Garfield Heights, the safety officials went above the call of duty for the residents.

At 5:30 a.m., Garfield Heights Fire Captain Daniel Kaminski placed a call to Service Department Foreman Mark Sikon, requesting aid for trapped residents. Sikon responded by sending out Paul Birk, a Service Department Laborer. Birk took a front end loader machine to Broadway and Warner roads to perform numerous rescues.

That morning, Broadway had water as high as the windshields on stranded vehicles. Sections of Broadway were buckled in due to water main breaks. Service Department crews worked quickly to set up barricades to address the flooding.

In a short amount of time, the Garfield Heights Fire Department and Paul Birk were able to rescue twelve people; including two dogs. Residents were rescued from homes and cars. Some of the homes had water coming in through the front doors over the front porches.

Captain Kaminski was very grateful for the assistance Birk provided for the multiple rescues that morning. Birk was quick to give credit to his fellow colleagues at the Service Department saying “All the guys deserve recognition for the work that was handled that morning. They did an amazing job cleaning and opening up Broadway for commuters.”

Paul Birk has been an employee for the Garfield Heights Service Department since April of 2001. His responsibilities include: tree trimming, street patching, sewer calls, sign crew and snow plowing.