Bnechis

On September 22, 2016 at 10:48 AM, EMT111 said:

Also, I've noticed that there is a trend of getting away from individual agency mutual aid plans and moving towards the closest available unit for both fire and ems. In Orange County, the dispatchers just put the request and location into the CAD and the system figures out who's closest available unit  based on drive time. 

Not in Westchester 

17 hours ago, AFS1970 said:

While I agree that many of the flags we see displayed are being displayed improperly, the fact remains that the flags in Arlington were ordered removed, not relocated. This is absolutely an attempt to stifle patriotism. If the real concern were to display the flag according to the US Code then that would be an easy enough policy to write.

"Absolutely an attempt to stifle patriotism" or this is a labor management thing, where the board is flexing its muscles?

a lot of people have assumed the first and most are blind to any other possibility 

9 hours ago, mustang22_2002 said:

The commissioners do not own the vehicles ... the tax payers do !!!

But the taxpayers have given the commissioners total control of them. The only say the taxpayers have is voting for one commissioner each year and an up or down bond vote to purchase.

3 hours ago, fire2141 said:

....If the chief as well as the chauffer's have no issues, why then the commissioners? Who better then them knows what's safe or not.  Remember, these people are in the public safety business. Last I knew commissioners weren't driving the apparatus.

You are correct, the commissioners are not driving the apparatus, but they are charged with setting department policy.

and even if the policies they set are improper or even outright wrong it is still their legal roll to do it.

I have read on a number of sites the backlash, almost all based on the board being unpatriotic or trying to be PC.

Beyond, what the board reported as being a safety issue, no one knows what the motivation is. 

But, I have witnessed, flags getting larger and larger on the back of rigs, to the point that we are disrespectful of the flag.

On engines, I have witnessed hose being laid over a flag that's so large that without wind or driving it hung below the level of the bed.

On ladders, I have witnessed grease and tattered ends on the flag where it whips against the turntable gear. I have also seen where it rubs on ground ladders as they are moved in and out of the ladder tunnel.

On all rigs, I have seen filthy flags, because the dirt that swirls around the rear of the rigs.

On the safety side, I have seen them hiding flashing safety lights, turn signals and break lights. Saw one get burned by high intensity flood lights and have seen firefighters grabbing the flag to help them climb the rig.

This is not patriotic, nor is it how the flag should be respected! I am not saying they should be removed, but consider how we are displaying them.

So what are the costs vs savings when we include insurance?

in my city the average taxpayer is paying less than $275/yr for a career fire department. If we eliminated the FD and gave back everyone's $ the cost of insurance on those average homes would increase by about $1,200/yr.

If we were to switch to a volunteer dept. to main the same rating as we have now, it would require a minimum of 48 volunteers responding on every fire call.

so the big question is how many communities can manage that?

1 hour ago, FFPCogs said:

In some communities people are willing to pay an increase for paid firefighters, in others they are not, no matter how small that increase might be. That is their choice and it is they that have to live with that decision.  Now I don't know anything about this town from the video, nor will I comment on their operations here...I wasn't there, and video or not, there are factors which I may not know that may have impacted this particular fire. If I lived in this (or any) community and the VFD always ended up with the same or similar results, than you bet your a$$ I'd be asking some questions and demanding some answers. 

 

From my own experience, one of the major factors that comes up when the idea of adding some career staffing is tossed about, beyond the money, is a resistance on the part of many volunteers. This resistance stems from fairly common belief among vollys that this step is the beginning of the end for their VFDs. It may not be right, prudent, proper, logical or whatever, but the feeling that once the door opens the days of the volunteers are numbered is very real...and it does influence decisions. And quite frankly it is not without at least a modicum of supporting evidence that this is true in some cases. This brings me back to my earlier post. While we all should be thinking about those we serve first, we often don't and we justify that with any number of reasons, including a fear of being eliminated over time. The animosity and "us" against "them" mentality which so permeates the fire service today has created this environment and the negative results that stem from it. No matter how "right" an argument may be the simple reality is all the stakeholders have to be on board so that those who are served are served in THEIR best interest. It is a travesty that this is so often overlooked in the pursuit of this or that agenda. There is much that binds us all as firefighters, and nothing more so than our common mission of protecting life and property, but we have let so much interfere with that truth and become so entrenched on our "side" of the divide that it sometimes seems impossible to bridge the gap. But that gap can be bridged with a little effort...and more importantly, a little courage to do what best for our citizens instead of ourselves.. 

Yes the community must decide, but they must also be given information that is truthful. We just witnessed in Portchester the mayor and chief swear they had 150 interior volunteers, when the records show less than 60. They said, don't worry, the dept. didn't need career personnel, but in two months time their are now mounting complaints that the response times are noticeably worst. If the dept. lies to itself and the public, how can the public make a proper judgement?

you are correct that this attitude exists, but in far to many VFD the real threat to the members is, declining membership, failing to respond in a timely manner and lack of training.

3 hours ago, gamewell45 said:

That's why most people have fire insurance; you hope you never need it, but if you do, it's there.

In the last five years we have seen at least a dozen middle to high end homes with catastrophic fires, that are insured and still sit burnout. The families can't afford to repair them even with the insurance.

about six years ago my free standing two car garage was distroyed in a storm and it took me over two years of fighting with the insurance company to pay. Even then they did not pay everything I was entitled to. The biggest fight I had was with getting replacement value, which they refused to pay until it was made very clear that my policy covered replacement value. Even then they didn't want to pay.

20 hours ago, bfd1144 said:

Jeez people get asshurt on here.. god forbid you have some fun!

At what point is it fun and what point is it a problem?

a brand new $1.4 million truck That belongs to the taxpayers?

A rule that only fog streams would be used... Until someone using a hand line switched to straight stream, to hit one of the crews in a bucket? How about when the ladder pipes were switched to straight stream and were turned on other platforms? Members operating in those platforms could have been seriously injured...but it's all in the name of fun.

We have been told not to use brushes to wash the truck as it can harm the finish. What is the possibility that a master stream will damage the paint?

Too bad it was economically flaud study.

my favorite part is the claim that volunteers have increased statewide by 30,000 - 40,000. 

1 hour ago, nydude2473 said:

Read that update and it still smells fishy to me. Mount Vernon is always going to be in ruins unless they just change the whole system up. The politics need to change and they need to bring in people to that fire department who know what they are doing and are willing to take the time to rebuild and fight for the necessities. The politicians can't be using emergency services as a political toy to bait with. Lives are at stake and those shenanigans need to stop. I don't know how many chiefs are retiring out of FDNY but maybe somebody with that level of experience should be running the department. That's just my two cents. If they don't take themselves seriously and try to make things better for themselves, nothing will change and they'll still be looked down upon. And that's not right to the firefighters who take the job seriously and to the people of Mount Vernon who rely on their services.

It has nothing to do with the quality or capabilities of the latest FD officials, it's the political oversight that is unwilling to allow the FD to manage itself 

On July 3, 2016 at 0:22 AM, gamewell45 said:

Then take the Village of Port Chester to task for misleading the public.  In the meantime I stand by my opinion that your term was divisive and was totally unnecessary.  It would be the same if I referred to interior firefighters as fire extinguishers since that is a major part of what they do; I doubt many firefighters would embrace that term; in fact I suspect many would take offense at it. 

 

If you find term firefighter objectionable when it's applied to Exterior personnel, fine but there is no need to be divisive; instead work for reform to legally change the titles if it offends you so much.  Being divisive accomplishes absolutely nothing positive.

You seam to be the only one with a real problem.

sure lets take Port Chester out, I can change the name to many many other communities that believe the local FD is properly staffed when it is operating at such low numbers it can not even meet two in two out without mutual aid. These depts include volunteer, combo and career. My fight has always been about under staffing and calling people something they are not folks the public and the department.

last year acity councilwoman in another Westchester community made the comment that she was so proud of the 120 volunteers in their department. The Fire Chief almost fell out of his chair. He had to explain to her that most of the members were in their 70's and 80's and no longer responded to calls, but they were still "members". That brought the total number down to about 50, with only 18 or 19 being interior he said. And of those only a few were really active. In fact they average less than 2 interior firefighters responding to calls. 

Not too worry, their are plenty of members!

On July 3, 2016 at 0:01 AM, gamewell45 said:

Perhaps you could share those sites with us ?

You said you googled "exterior firefighter" and found nothing.

i said I googled "yard breather" and found a number of sites.

maybe instead of challenging me, you need to learn how to use google?

On July 1, 2016 at 11:00 AM, gamewell45 said:

Ok that's fine; my point was there is no need to use a divisive term as the OP did in his post.  If in fact people feel this is a misleading term, then perhaps they should push to make it state law where any FD has to list by category and job function what each firefighter does and make it available to the public.  That will solve the advertising problem.

The misleading term is firefighter, because the public expects a firefighter. When your kid or parent is trapped inside and a bunch of people show up with turnout gear, they expect them to actually do something.

Recently, the Mayor of Port Chester claimed that the PCFD had 300 members, 150 interior. But we know that they only paid for 75 bailouts (required by NYS Law) but 16 were for the career FF's of both PCFD and RBFD. So they only have 59 at best. To many depts lie, even to themselves about the number of members.

On July 1, 2016 at 10:34 AM, gamewell45 said:

Barry, I googled your term "Firefighter Helpers" and there is nothing listed under that.  Therefore I'm going to conclude that it is nothing more then a divisive term you threw into the mix.  The term "exterior" is more appropriate in this case and I'm sure you are well aware of what Exterior Firefighters roles are in the fire service.

Actually if I wanted to used a decisive term I would have used "Yard Breather" and I googled that and found a whole bunch of sites and definitions. Now these are members who are considered interior but never get inside because they use all their air walking back and forth outside.

if you watch all the videos on YouTube you can see that a vast majority of exterior personnel stand around waiting for the fire to go out.

2 hours ago, velcroMedic1987 said:

Pretty damning allegations. 

Makes you wonder...

Particularly about modify / falsifying official records and possible insurance fraud.

When it is out of town, it's almost as available the rest of the week when sadly in many departments, their are no members available to respond or as is the policy in many depts, the engine goes first, so by the time the ladder arrives, it is blocked out by hose. 

6 hours ago, AFS1970 said:

 

I have never understood this interior/exterior designation. but I will dispute the fact that the roles do not exist in career departments..........

 

On a more positive note there are the seniority based driver jobs, where a firefighter essentially never has to go inside again. While not technically an exterior member, the interior history can be measured in years not months with some. I realize these are often senior men who have in many ways paid their dues, but the same argument could be said about some of the veteran Volunteers.

Yes our senior men often get the job of driver, but that does not mean they are exterior. They still must pass their annual physical as an interior firefighter, the must pass mask fit testing. If on the truck, they are the OV or Roof, if on the engine, they are expected to operate in high rise fires depending on arrival order. And the 4th due engine including the driver is always assigned as FAST on working fires. If they can't do this, it's time for retirement.

10 hours ago, nfd2004 said:

I believe there was a meeting scheduled last night (6/6/16) on the fate of those Eight Laid Off Port Chester Firefighters. Was there any decision made on that ?

It was tabled for two weeks. With agreement from the union. Time needed to resolve a number of financial and legal issues. 

The IAFF gave $1,000 to each of the 8 members to help them over the next 2 weeks.

1 hour ago, huzzie59 said:

"From Tooth To Tail".  Are the supporting personnel in an army still called "Soldiers"?

Or only the ones firing the bullets?

 

Those "support" soldiers still have to qualify on the range, get thru chemical training and then while driving supply trucks they have had to fight, some being killed, other injured and some captured. They are placed in support rolls because that's where they are needed and that's where they will perform best, not because they are unwilling or unable to do it!

48 minutes ago, SECTMB said:

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you are an exterior firefighter when you can still perform duties such as driving, organizing, setting up and supporting fireground equipment and operations but are not physically up to wearing SCBA, advancing an interior line or bailing out if need be, etc.

 

Or to put it another way, you can still help out and be of use even if you are older and maybe too out of shape to go inside to extinguish the fire.  That's not necessarily a knock, there are alot of functions to be performed at a fire and it takes a team effort.  Not every player can carry the ball. Somebody has to set up the play, hand off and block.

 

They didn't have the distinction between interior and exterior when I joined in the early 70's.  It came much later.

So then let's call it what it really is...

you ou have Firefighters and you have Firefighter Helpers.

i see too many departments that claim how many members they have, but they won't admit to themselves or the public they are sworn to protect when they do not have enough interior "firefighters" to actually do a search or make a real attack.

29 minutes ago, nfd2004 said:

 

 As I understand it, career firefighters are forced to be laid off by city fire chiefs due to budget issues.

 

 As I understand it here, the Village of Rye was paying one million dollars to contract to the village of Port Chester for their fire protection. Was it Port Chester or Rye that laid off these eight firefighters ? Does the responsibility fall on that local group of board members ? Why were those three chiefs removed from their positions if they did nothing wrong ? If Port Chester was having budget problems were there other employees laid off besides all eight of those firefighters ? Were other departments such as education, police etc advised to make similar serious cutbacks due to a budget issue ?

The claim was budget issues. But layoffs save between $600,000 (the amount the budget was reduced by) and $800,000 (the amount the mayor later claimed it would save) and the $900,000 that "Ryebrook contributes" which would no longer be accepted means that eliminating the career staff would cost more money than it saves.

PC did the layoffs 

fails on the Mayor and village board of Port Chester 

the Chiefs were not removed

no other municipal layoffs or cost reductions

1 hour ago, AFS1970 said:

Actually between this and the other thread, we did not learn that 3 chiefs got together and hatched some nefarious plan to get rid of career firefighters. All that has been reported was that the village council voted to do this. There was some indication of a meeting with the Chiefs before this vote was taken but I doubt anyone who posts here was in that meeting.

 

What we did get was people immediately calling for the chiefs to be thrown out of office because they did not save the jobs. The problem with this line of reasoning is that politicians will do whatever they want, and no matter how loud a chief protests, they will generally not budge. It is the responsibility of a fire chief to run their fire departments and as any chief will tell you this is usually done with what you are given. Thus when the layoffs happened as much as it sucks there is still a fire department that needs to continue as best it can.

 

Layoffs are never a good option, but they do happen. If a major city suffered layoffs would you call for the career chief to be fired because he did not protect the manpower? I am not knowledgeable about the situation in PCFD prior to the council vote. I don't know who said what to who, who had a grudge against who, or who had what influence on the vote.

 

As for the public voting, this can be a double edged sword. The same public that wants more services from the government almost always wants to pay less taxes. One never knows just how the people will vote.

 

 

It's not that the Chiefs "Did not save the jobs". It's that when the mayor said: "before we proceed with the budget amendments, is the fire chief ok with these changes?" Once the chief said yes, they moved forward with the budget change. 

They never said the words: "layoffs, fire department, career firefighters, etc. so they had already planned this out, because they were afraid to even mention it in front of the public. We all understand that at times the chief has to live with what's been given to them. But to not complain at all? Not to fight for your department? Not to simply agree that this is completely acceptable. Particularly when their has been a running battle for years.

7 minutes ago, Dinosaur said:

 

Sue 'em!  It's a safety issue and the PSC should really stop ignoring things like NFPA.

On a side note, who says that PSC trumps DOS?  Is that statutory or just the laissez faire bureacracy in Albany failing us yet again?

 

Sue who?

agreed. They've also ignored ISO and IWWA standards 

not sure. But that's the impression I get from the PSC