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Was the bullying comments made "BEFORE" her death or "AFTER". Was this a suicide or a murder ? Is there any signs leading to the fact that she would want to commit suicide ? Did any members who worked with her pick up any ideas of such activity ? Bearing in mind that generally, firefighters deal with the public in suicide attempts. Who made these comments on that site and when ?
 
  Should bosses or leaders in any occupation focus on this type of behavior ? Could this become more prevalent in todays cyber world of unknowns ?
 
  A lot of questions do come up.

I remember that episode, it had the A-Team being hired by a small private fire department, the chief was played by Stephanie Kramer, much more famous for her role on Hunter. They had a contract for a town but were in a battle with a bigger corporation that was trying to take over the town's fire service. I think there was some sort of involvement with organized crime also.
 
Murdock's crazy of the week was to carry a seltzer bottle dressed as a miniature copy of himself as a firefighter with him.

Yes, you read the title right. How do I not remember this episode?
 

It would appear that the death of the MD medic is also responsible for the life of another.  MOS returning from his funeral were first on the scene of a vehicle fire with the occupant unable to exit the vehicle due to a medical emergency.  The MOS were able to rescue the occupant before the vehicle became engulfed in flame which would have rendered her a horrible death were it not for the intervention of the MOS.
 
Even in death, he is a lifesaver. 

So what's the big solution? I've seen a lot of complaints but not many answers. I've seen more certifications are needed (but also that they don't qualify one to be an officer), they need more experience(in a department that doesn't see much fire I don't know where they'll get it) and that the public is to blame for not knowing enough(but if we can't figure it out I don't know how they will) . 
 
Unfortunately it seems this FD simply has to make due with what they have. If they don't have enough qualified candidates do the simply not have a chief? I can understand maybe getting rid of an assistant chief position, but someone ultimately needs to be in charge. This only leads me to two possible answers:
 
1. Hire a paid chief. It's getting more and more difficult for people to maintain the qualifications and run a department in their spare time.  
 
2. MERGE. Can anyone please explain to me how we've come to the conclusion that we'll be able to find someone to be qualified to run an FD in every 2 square miles of this county? How do we expect any of these small departments to provide the manpower (either volunteer or career) and find a chief? If Rye wanted to have the staffing to meet NFPA recommendations of 17 at a structure fire, with 4 shifts (and no admin or training staff), that's a 68 man roster. With only 15k living in the city, that would be like Yonkers having 900+ firemen! While the union can throw out all the hashtags they want, wouldn't they be better off suggesting something that could work and not kill the tax base ? Between Rye, rye Brook, port Chester, mamaroneck and larchmont you have a bunch of understaffed departments right on top of each other. With a "Shoreline regional FD" you could afford to properly staff it with career members, have an ample number of volunteers and only need one chief to manage it. Or they could continue to rely on 3 mutual aid departments for every room and contents fire while looking for a new chief every year on every exit of I-95.  
 
That's what I'd do if my union was in that situation.  Just saying. 
 

I have said it before, certifications do not make you a good officer, but they are what we have for now.
 
I think qualifications should be a combination of years of service, run/response stats & training/certifications. The idea being you should score high in all three categories but you can make up for shortcomings in one by having higher stats in the others. Bearing in mind that no system is perfect.
 
However once a system is in place it becomes the responsibility of the department and the individual member together to ensure that there are qualified members and that the standard still meets the needs of the departments.
 
I remember looking at a set of by laws for a department that required FF1 to get off probation, yet never required EMR or EMT, despite about 55% of the runs being EMS related. Now I am not saying we should sacrifice FF1 but you should probably need both if that is the way your department is responding.
 
I know of one department that required HazMat tech to be chief, they later revisited that and got rid of it because they really were not running the number of HazMat calls they once anticipated.

It's all about the certs. Never the experience.

The citizens there and in most communities have no clue about the local FD. 
 
They are much more concerned with the goings on at the yacht club and the golf club.
 
Sadly it is neither a hoax or an April Fools Joke.
 
Thier former city manager said it best when he described the department as: "Staffed for Failure"

a pulse

Thank you to our EMTs and Paramedics for the work you do. In the cold of winter or the heat of summer. We all depend on the job you do.
 
I would like to give special thanks to the EMTs and Medics who saved two of my very close friends within the last two years. Both retired firefighters and both in cardiac arrest from a serious heart condition. Yes, they are alive today because of the kind of work you do.  There are countless others alive today because of you.
 
 What would we do without you. This is a small example of what you do.
 
 www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmMX6g6MoWU

Beyond that Alan there is also the cadre of officers/leadership that meet a requirement or creates their own standard and then prevents anyone else from being able to attain it. Some call that job security, I call self serving, but either way it ultimately causes big problems in succession not to mention morale.
 

The 2nd assistant Rye chief is a 5 year member 22 years old.  And has never been in a fire.  1st asst has recently returned to the  dept after being gone for many many years.   

This is all part of a vicious circle. Higher certifications are created. Department changes rules to require those. A few candidates become chiefs. Department does nothing to help additional members get certified. Chiefs step down/retire. Lack of qualified members leads to lowering requirements.
 
I don't know how it is in NY but I know in CT you can contract the state academy to come in and run a class at your department. Granted you can't make the class meet everyone's schedule, but you can get members certified if the department and the members actually have the will to do it.
 
The key is to make any requirements reasonable.

NFD2004, this would be an extremely funny video if it weren't so true and I keep wondering how much worse this situation could get.  I am afraid of the answer. As a resident of the city I am ashamed of what is happening.

Here is an interesting video that I thought might explain the kind of person Rye might be looking for as the next fire chief. Although this chief does seem to be quite educated.
 
www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCFKMjiTme0

http://www.local2029.com/news-and-events/2016/3/29/board-of-fire-wardens-weakens-qualifications-to-be-chief
 
What do you need to be chief?

Do the citizens of this place who depend on their fire department know this ?
 
Do they know that this is the guy that will be responsible for spending their tax dollars when it comes to fire protection ?
 
Do they know that this is the guy that is going to be responsible for life and death decisions involving their family members and friends ?
 
My last question is, "Is this a hoax or some kind of April Fool joke" ?

Based on what I read here, "annexing", is probably the way to go as "x635" says in his above post. Even with 28 members on the rolls, as "bigrig77" says, how many could actually respond to a serious incident if needed. I'm sure Pittsburgh must respond anyway as a mutual aid company. Is it fair to say that the mutual aid goes the other way as well. My guess is it probably doesn't.
 
Seeing people cry at loosing their fire department which served this area for several years is very sad. But crying for some unfortunate person or family who may die in a fire if things stay the same could be much worse. It just doesn't make any sense to continue to operate in this type of system. It is wishful thinking but the reality is that it just cant be done. The people of that town really have much more to loose if they decided to continue as is.
 
 

They were running with a 1979 Ford/Hamerly, 1999 HME Pumper, 1975 American La France ladder truck. I think the town made the right choice. Why waste $1.5 million on the vols when they only went on 61 calls. I don't think that money total took into consideration that a new rig needed to be purchased. They had a GoFundMe site set up to buy a ladder. The town weighted the options and it would be cheaper for Pittsburgh to come into the town when they had a call. It works out to about one call every week, easy coverage. The borough is 0.4 sq mi. with a population of 3,330 people. There are only 28 members on the rolls but i think we all know about the roll numbers and actual firefighters are two different numbers. They should be happy a fully staffed department with properly trained guys are now covering the town. 

While it certainly sucks for its members, does a .4 sq mile town really need it's own department? It's certainly unlikely that a town with 3,000 people could afford the apparatus or supply the manpower for a self sufficient department. At the end of the day the town needs to give the best fire protection possible and do what's right for th taxpayer. 

Well said, John.
 
I noticed the article and the members interviewed pointed out the more social and fraternal parts of the organization then the actual safety aspects. And people said they would move out of the town because of this, but no one said they were willing to pay more taxes for it.
 
If you look at their website ( http://ingramvfd.org/ ), they have equipment that looks very old and substandard, and will need replacement soon. One is a midmount quint that is close to 40 years old, and to buy and maintain even a used one is an expensive thing. And three aging, single engine firehouses. And, as pointed out above, they only do 61 runs a year.  If you look at the map, they are enveloped by Pittsburgh.  It's what in some areas of this county would be a single engine first due. In this particular situation, not looking at it emotionally and objectively, it makes sense.
 
I understand this is a difficult, devastating thing. But, again, given the picture of the department portrayed by the members in the media, there's no reason why they can't continue on as a service organization to the town and still keep providing what they do. They could probably keep an Engine somehow.
 
This is going to be the future of the fire service. I was speaking with a friend from Oklahoma today, he reminded me of my time in Texas, where this is called "annexing".  Except in Austin, where everything is going from being a regional county service to a local service again lol.

Please also note, from a buffy perspective, that ALF Quint they have is pretty sweet.

I feel for the volunteers but the company had 61 runs last year. Im sure a dept. like Pittsburgh can pick that up no problem. This will sting for a while but I'm sure its in the towns best interest , they could use the extra cash for law enforcement 

 
http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2016/04/12/ingram-borough-council-votes-to-eliminate-volunteer-fire-company/

National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week 2016 will be, April 10-16. I hope that all Telecommunicators/Dispatchers get the recognition that they deserve during this time. We often get overlooked or forgotten about. Remember, we are the FIRST 1st Responders. 

 
 
That doesn't seem too far off at all.  Sadly, we don't perpetuate the greatest public image with multi-agency, tiered responses that result in a dozen people showing up in 5 different vehicles but no ambulance.