RUMFORD – Newly-elected Selectman Robert Cameron took responsibility last week for causing 10 firefighters to be suspended after asking their union to publicly endorse his candidacy for the selectman’s seat.

When they did, via a letter to the editor by firefighters union Local 1601 President Mark Tripp, neither firefighters nor Cameron realized the action violated a town ordinance.

The ordinance prohibits municipal employees from influencing an election.

Tripp’s letter, printed in the June 4 edition of the Rumford Falls Times, also supported incumbent Selectman Greg Buccina, who wasn’t re-elected.

Cameron, a former Maine legislator who represented Rumford and has since been trying to get re-elected, said he felt bad after learning that Tripp was suspended without pay for a week and that the other nine drew staggered suspensions of a day without pay.

Late last month, the union filed a grievance against the town regarding the disciplinary action. Although Tripp has declined to elaborate on the grievance, he claims the town hasn’t adhered to the union contract. The union is in the third year of a three-year contract that ends on June 30, 2009.

The grievance disputes the suspensions and seeks repayment of withheld pay, reinstatement of any lost seniority and expungement of the disciplinary action in the firefighters’ personnel records.

Cameron also told fellow board members and interim Town Manager Len Greaney that he was concerned about the Rumford law, which forces people who want to be a town employee to relinquish their rights to free speech.

Selectmen, however, took no action on the matter at their July 3 board meeting.