KRILL: Setting the record straight

On Sept. 16, Sue Damon wrote a My Turn column supporting the Timberlake Fire recall. In opposition, the city of Athol wrote a letter to the editor on Sept. 29 which included defamatory statements and falsely accused me of also authoring Damon's letter. I faxed/mailed a letter to Athol notifying them of the error and asked for an apology, but never received a reply.

I informed Athol I had nothing to do with Damon's letter and didn't know of it until after it was published. Damon quoted me from a conversation in response to a question; that was all. The quote was truthful; we were not informed the main water reservoir was empty, thus reducing fire hydrant flows.

We probably could have controlled a residential fire with the lower flows as Athol pointed out. However, as my quote stated, a larger commercial building fire could have been devastating if we expected to get more than 2,000 gallons per minute of water, but only got 920. Knowing your water system's capacity impacts what resources are called and the firefighting strategy.

Regarding the Community Christmas Dinner, the community does a fantastic job organizing it for a good cause. However, in 2008 a citizen was injured because of a fire code violation. Consequently, I was duty bound to inform Athol of the observed hazards and pledged to help make the 2009 dinner safe, which I did. This issue was not mentioned in Damon's letter, however Athol chose to bring it up, attacking me for preventing injuries in their building.

JACK KRILL

Athol