NEWBURGH – After Newburgh officials called the Middletown administration to see if they could hire any of the 16 firefighters to be laid off because of budget cuts, Middletown said it could hire at least one.

That hit a roadblock because the man is on probation and won’t complete firefighter school until December 20.

Middletown officials said they were willing to hire the man, who has family in that city, on a permanent basis, but because Newburgh has four firefighters on probation, that was nixed.

Middletown Civil Service Administrator Joseph Masi was miffed by the Newburgh decision. “There are communities that were willing to help and I’m sure Middletown is not the only one that would like to help out the firefighters, police officers and anyone else from the City of Newburgh,” he said.

Newburgh firefighters Local 589 President Brendan Hogan said two of the four men on probation are disabled veterans and to hire just one of the four, would throw the seniority list out of kilter.

He said three of the four probationary men have offers for other jobs and if the fourth one can also be hired elsewhere, they would reconsider their position and all them to be picked up.