Their board meeting last Thursday evening at Fairfield Public Library was the second one in which commissioners questioned 43-year-old Parks, who is also a Fairfield RTM member and father of three.
Parks injured himself playing football on April 1 with what seems to be a groin pull, or tear. He then took seven sick days from April 2 to April 14, and played in a football game on April 18.
At the end of the previous meeting on May 28, commissioners told Parks that he should return with an attorney, which he did.
At the end of last Thursday's meeting, Fairfield Town attorney Richard Saxl and Park's attorney, Eric Chester, agreed to decide in the next few days on wording of a document that would waive Park's right to privacy and allow Saxl to question university officials concerning what Parks did in practice on the days in question.
The Fire Commissioners also voted unanimously Thursday night to reject a grievance filed by the firefighter's union.
The grievance protested Parks two-day suspension without pay, not for taking sick days, but for insubordination, becauses he refused, in mid-May, to answer Fire Chief Richard Felner's questions about the sick days.
Parks cited his right to privacy at that time, but according to the union contract, Parks must explain his absence to the chief's satisfaction.
Parks attorney said, "We all know he's here because an article in the paper (the New Haven Register) make it seem he was playing football ... Did he go to practice? Yes."
However, he said, the totality of the evidence would show that Parks sustained an injury that would prevent him from performing the duties of a firefighter.
Parks then gave each commissioner a note from a physician's assistant and a note from a trainer.
"The substance of the note (from the physician's assistant) seems not to address the issue," said Commissioner David Zabel, noting that it only said that Parks had an injury and didn't say that he couldn't work.
"Did you ask (the physician's assistant) to leave out everything on the cause of the injury?" Zabel asked Parks.
"No, this is what I got," said Parks.
Noting that the firefighter was out sick on the 13th and 14th, but played in a game on the 18th, Commission chairman Richard Popilowski commented that it was a "miraculous recovery."
When Park's attorney objected to those words, Popilowski said he used the words "because I've had this type of injury and, believe me, it didn't take three days."
"Based on information from the University of New Haven, you returned to practice on the 13th and 14th. Please describe what activities you were engaged in," asked Zabel.
"I don't know. Full pads and doing something. I don't know," said Parks.
His attorney pointed out that the trainer's notes said that Parks was doing agility training on that day.
"I personally am most interested in hearing from Firefighter Parks what he was doing on those days," said Zabel. He asked whether the practice was with full pads. Did Parks participate in defense, line drills, contact activities? asked the former high-school football player.
Parks could not give a specific answer.
Zabel noted that there was possible termination involved and said, "I would expect an employee faced with that to give truthful answers.
"What you say is going to be part of the evaluation and analysis that we do ... I want to believe what you tell me ... I want to know as best I can what happened, so I want to figure out if you're being truthful to the commission," said Zabel.
Commissioner Felix Giannini said that he was having trouble with Park's lack of specificity.
"I was a gymnast in high school and I feel like I could answer any questions about practices that took place in the seventies," said Giannini. He said he thought it should be possible for Parks to describe in great detail what the helmets-only practice was on April 13 and 14.
However, Parks, who said he has a 4.0 average in his studies, said he couldn't recollect.
Asked about the meeting with the fire chief after the chief was told about Parks playing football and then sent a copy of the New Haven Register, Parks said that he had thought, rightly or wrongly, that it was a privacy issue. "If someone' out to get me, I want to know why," he said.