Blethen Maine News Service

SKOWHEGAN, Maine — In the early morning of Feb. 2, 2007, Katherine ''Kait'' Billings, a volunteer firefighter and first responder in Clinton, donned her emergency gear and joined crews from five towns fighting a house fire off Route 100.

As a result, she didn't report for work that morning at the Community Care agency offices in Skowhegan. For that, according to a lawsuit she filed in Kennebec County Superior Court this week, she was fired.

The lawsuit could be the first test of a Maine law passed in 2005 to protect volunteer firefighters when they are late or absent from their regular jobs because of fire emergencies.

Community Care provides social and mental health services to foster children and foster parents. The agency has nine offices throughout Maine.

Brent Singer, a Bangor attorney who is the clerk and registered agent for Community Care, said Friday that the nonprofit agency had not been served notice of the legal action, ''so it's hard to respond.''

He deferred questions to Executive Director Kate Davis, who said the agency can't respond to the claim because it hasn't received documents on the case.

''We terminate an employee only when it's something we have to do,'' she said.

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday, seeks back pay, compensatory damages and attorneys' fees. It says Billings' firing violated the law protecting volunteer firefighters from disciplinary action if they are absent or late for work because of an emergency response.

James A. Billings of Augusta, a lawyer who represents Katherine Billings but is not related to her, said the fire to which his client responded was big enough to keep crews busy into the early morning.

''The call went out at 1 a.m.,'' he said. ''They were there all night fighting the fire.''

Billings notified Community Care that she would not be able to report to work because she had responded to the fire, the lawsuit says.

''I used a sick day,'' Billings said Thursday. ''We were released from the fire station at 9 a.m. and I called them at 7:30. My first visit (for work) would have started around 10.''

Katherine Billings said that in the year she worked for Community Care, she was absent only three times, including last Feb. 2.

James Billings said the 2005 Maine law is clear in such cases. He said his client seeks reinstatement of lost benefits, costs and any other remedies that would return his client to her position.

Katherine Billings was earning $11.50 per hour working 40 hours a week for Community Care.

She said she has been a firefighter since 1990, the last six years with the Clinton Fire Department. She now works as an emergency medical technician in Portland and works per diem for Delta Ambulance and Sebasticook Valley Ambulance Service.

Portland Press Herald