99subi

The Vulcan Society IS Racism in the FDNY. This is a group with one agenda and they do not care about how they achieve their goal. Every day they operate is another day they do damage to the FDNY, the services it renders and the lives of New York City residents.

Rest in Peace First Lieutenant Compton. We've lost another TRUE American hero.

here is my response.
As a vol myself I wish more places would hire so I could get on the job. Additionally i don't see anything of that nature that being said in the article...

loser.

Sorry...but no...not accurate at all. You might be by some basic standard be a "firefighter" but there are caveats within that realm simply put. This isn't to rattle cages..but it is what it is. I see and have seen all levels of "firefighters" in my experience as a professional firefighter, volunteer firefighter, fire instructor, EMT, Paramedic etc. And the bottom line there is a difference. All this nonsense of paid "volunteer" has me literally cracking up. Take any other person who volunteers..for example most hospitals have volunteers...if they in turn compensate for time...they are then PER DIEM EMPLOYEES, not paid volunteers. Spare me the antics with titles. Call it what it is. And the biggest blaring thing that no one has touched...if you are looking at now paying per call..you have a staffing issue...get off of it already and actually look at the staffing costs instead of spewing the sky is falling it will cost too much money routine. Then there is yet another issue...who becomes the gate keeper? Will there be an interview process for new EMPLOYEES? Or will it stay the same? How are you going to deal with the potential flood gates opening for those who want to make a few bucks and not take the process serious?
Saying a firefighter is a firefighter is like saying a doctor is a doctor. But if I'm sick or injured a person comes up and say "hi I'm doctor so and so.." that's great..but what kind of doctor is he? When did he go to school. Where did he go to school. How much has he practiced? Is he board certified? Is he a family practitioner? Podiatrist? Proctologist? Optimalogist? ...Or even better...what if he has nothing more then a PHD.
So lets get serious...I don't see very many apparatus with "XYZ Professional Fire Department" or "XYZ Combination Department" but I see quite a few "XYZ Volunteer Fire Department" or combination departments where the volunteer side on all their t-shirts, stickers and forms adds "volunteer" in front of the FD part. If you get paid for a service...you are no longer a volunteer period. You are hired help and masking yet a bigger issue.

loser.

loser.

I vol. for the community and the experience. What "perks" are you talking about?The last meeting i went to for free food was... never. I go to drills, thats it. None of the dance bs or any of that.To me its a job, not a social gathering.

Stop getting offended. Volunteer is the obvious distinction between depts that can guarantee a level of training and staffing 24/7 here in the tri-state. No one can tell me they'd rather roll the dice with a volunteer mutual aid partner than a paid dept with a guaranteed response. Its not because one is volunteer or paid, it is because of the guaranteed response. Until a volunteer dept institutes a program that guarantees a timely response with a minimum number of qualified ffs it would be reckless for any dept to chose them over a reasonably close paid dept.

I vol. for the community and the experience. What "perks" are you talking about?The last meeting i went to for free food was... never. I go to drills, thats it. None of the dance bs or any of that.To me its a job, not a social gathering.

As usual Cogs a very articulate, thoughtful and respectful post. However, you may have misinterpreted my post...it was not a "blanket statement" and I do not feel that volunteers can not provide effective fire protection in all cases. I do believe that in some areas of the country volunteers are the only option and the protection they provide is effective.
However, my comment stands...in the area in which I live and work, the media allows many volunteer fire departments to operate completely ineffectively and wastefully with absolutely no hard questions being asked such as the ones which were asked in the article at the top of this thread.
I challenge you to identify a specific example to prove that a career department has a policy of bypassing a nearby volunteer department which can guarantee that its members meet minimum training standards and personnel levels, and which has a better resonse time into the requesting career departments district.
By perpetuating this myth you do a diservice to the people we are sworn to protect. Why would you make such a statement? Surely you understand that the physical location of a fire station is irrelevant when that firehouse has no guarantee that an adequately sized crew of properly trained firefighters are inside of it?
Please don't make this a career vs. volunteer issue. This is an issue of being honest and realistic with ourselves and the public whom we are sworn to protect. Let's put ego and false pride aside and admit the realities here...

I vol. for the community and the experience. What "perks" are you talking about?The last meeting i went to for free food was... never. I go to drills, thats it. None of the dance bs or any of that.To me its a job, not a social gathering.

I vol. for the community and the experience. What "perks" are you talking about?The last meeting i went to for free food was... never. I go to drills, thats it. None of the dance bs or any of that.To me its a job, not a social gathering.

I vol. for the community and the experience. What "perks" are you talking about?The last meeting i went to for free food was... never. I go to drills, thats it. None of the dance bs or any of that.To me its a job, not a social gathering.

Volunteer and preplanning... hah,that'll be the day,then again it might happen if they offer free food with the preplan excercise ...
flame away

Volunteer and preplanning... hah,that'll be the day,then again it might happen if they offer free food with the preplan excercise ...
flame away

Forget about online. how about in the field? Ive seen a LT with a confederate flag sticker on the back of his helmet... Professionalism right out the window....

I'll say it...consolidation yet again might be a better option for the entire area...Yorktown, Millwood, Mohegan...hire more staff...period.

Out of control??? All I see on here is grown men having a conversation about a very controversial subject regarding Yorktown.
And if they were to enter into a mutual aid agreement for every call, you're right. We would talk about it. It's covering up a much larger issue of a lack of manpower.
Nobody is attacking YHFD for trying to protect their constituents, but in this day and age with EVERYONE looking at how we spend taxpayer money, we/they can do better.

If memory serves, When it was last up for public vote, this point came up and the answer from the commissioners was something along the lines of none, but this will get volunteers from other parts of town to "hang out here".
Me Too!
If YFD builds this house, can YFD guarentee a response time with apparatus and manpower that is acceptable to its own standards?
Since, YFD would still respond they would have no liability, particularly since the voters turn down expansion.
This new fire station with an engine, tanker and dive truck will not help anyone if it does not have staffing. If they have outgrown the other fire stations, they need to consider:
1) do they have the right size fleet (that they can staff and operate)?
2) do the existing stations need additions?
3) could they add a bay in Millwood to help handle it? And going back in history, didn't YFD have an engine stationed in Millwood many years ago?
With this move and the state mandated tax cap, the tax payers may never allow it.
And most can't get a winning team on the field.
Firefighters put out fire, not fire stations and rigs
The dead horse is any dept that can not put enough interior firefighters onscene in under 10 minutes 24/7/365. As vollunteer numbers drop and career depts face reduction, this will continue to be an issue. Most of the country is already seen the light but we would rather be taxed high and get poor service for it, just so we can be proud of our own little kingdom.

Maybe the responsible action should've been to say..."hey lets just give that part of the fire district to Millwood, they're only a half a mile away anyway"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nice job...
WHy fight for a middle class tax break when we'll just spend it on new firehouses we don't need....Oh sorry i forgot about the surge in fire duty

Im glad to see taxpayer money go to good use to build a firehouse where its so desperately needed, and there are no other firehouses around for miles....
Millwood.

Also this week it was reported that just with the four uniformed unions, annual pension costs will exceed annual salary costs. Then there was the highly reported case of the rubber room teacher who after ten years out of the classroom continues to collect 100K in salary on his way to an 85K a year pension for life.
There are 8 million people in NYC alone and only a couple of hundred thousand city, state workers. As long as the public continues to read stories of ex uniformed services employees collecting pensions twice the average annual income of private sector persons, some on disability pensions while competing in marathons, etc. and
stories that 3/4 of all train conductors get disability pensions, and rubber room stories galore, the public will not rally to the defense of the unions issues.
The public's attitude is going to be do more with less, just like we have to do. A four man engine crew will just have to do the same work as a five man crew, and so on. etc, etc.
The unions have been their own best and worst enemy. Particularly the teachers. We have continued to spend more and more every year on the schools and yet we produce more morons than ever before with lower graduation and test scores. With the schools in particular there is no correlation between more spending and better results.
In the case of the City, you can't blame Bloomberg. You need to go back to, at least, Lindsay and everyone, Mayors and Council members since and every head of every union that 'punted', 'kicked the can', etc. and failed to act responsibly. Same on all the other levels of Govt.
They didn't act responsibly so we've already reached the tipping point, we're on the downside now and there isn't anybody within these groups that has the knowledge, ability and leadership to change the direction of the slide. There are just too many selfish interests to accommodate and not enough public money left to do it.

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/01/10287851-nypd-cop-is-shot-in-the-head-expected-to-make-full-recovery
Incredible.

Imagine if something like this were to happen in Westchester County?? I can only imagine the hissy fits that would be thrown. Good for them,glad to see people stepped up to the plate and made things happen.
On a side note. How will RFD provide these FF's? do they plan on hiring new ones or just adding more hours to the current FF's?