Fire division chief accused of using racist slur

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The fire marshal of Jacksonville Fire-Rescue Division is under investigation for making racist remarks about people attending last weekend's Welcome to Rockville concert.

According to an email to the city, Division Chief Kevin Jones used a racial slur -- the N word -- to describe people going to the music festival held at Metro Park. According to the complaint, Jones was going over the number of people allowed in the park when he allegedly said: "We can't allow more than 20,000 people in the park and if those ------- try to put more than that in the park, they will have to deal with me."

The complaint goes on to say that he went on to laugh about the remarks and making light of it.

DOCUMENT: Read email complaint about Chief Jones

Some are surprised to hear that the head of the city's fire prevention division is under investigation for making a racial remark. Jones has been with the department for years, but he has only been the fire marshal for several months.

Jones would not comment Friday about the allegations, but his boss -- Fire Chief Marty Senterfitt -- did.

"This matter is under investigation," Senterfitt said. "The whole issue is, a chief made an inappropriate statement or used an inappropriate phase and it's under investigation."

The person who filed the complaint said it was offensive to him as a black man because of the racial issues going on in the department... something Senterfitt found odd.

"The individual involved -- the chief -- he is an African-American. He is the epitome of diversity on the fire department," Senterfitt said. "Diversity is very important on this job, to make sure we understand every side of this community. The danger is we can not allow diversity to be used as a weapon or tool for ulterior motives to attack other people. Until we do this investigation its hard to say where this is coming from."


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