Day after Day after Day no real fires, but Jim Ireton and Jake Day believe everything Richard "Fatso" Hopeless says and want to pay for over 60 paid firemen. They want to extend the Federal fire grant that paid for 12 additional firemen for 2 years which is going to expire soon. Hopeless(I refuse to call him chief because he wouldn't make a pimple on a real fire chiefs butt)claims they can limit any fire to one room only, but in reality they let an entire building burn down in their own back yard and it was a small building at that. They saw it burning and responded way before it was dispatched and they still let it burn down. Proves the paid firemen are almost worthless and the volunteer firemen in the County can handle the real fire calls. Get rid of the paid firemen and let the volunteers handle the fire calls. Make EMS a separate department and you will find EMS is actually self sufficient.
What is funny is the call to assist Mardela, the volunteers were given the chance to respond and take the tanker. Guess what not one showed up. Guess the volunteers can handle all the calls right? So what happens if there is no career fire crew, and they fail to get out on a fire with victims trapped? Why not have the fire crews as an insurance policy.
I think if most people actually found out the time difference between a paid duty crew responding and a volunteer only response was they would change their tune pretty quick.
A paid fire crew strives to be in gear and out the door within 2 minutes of when the call goes out. The average response time for a volunteer crew is around 5-7minutes from the time the call goes out to the time the fire apparatus actually leaves the station.
Then no one ever takes into account that besides the Salisbury stations, not one single station in Wicomico county run more than 400 fire/rescue/assist (fire app response) calls per year. Yet each of the three Salisbury stations run 1000-1500 each year. The average county fire department has 50-70 volunteers (15-20 who actually respond regularly), and that's for 150-400 calls. Can you imagine how many volunteers Salisbury would need to handle the 4000-5000 (fire app response) calls they run each year.
Then take into account that just last week a wicomico county fire department got toned out for a house fire (along with 2 other stations) yet couldn't get a single fire truck/engine out the door because none of their driver/engineer qualified volunteers were available to drive nor pump the engine.
That is the problem the public is not educated enough about the fire service. They also think if the career members were gone their taxes would go down. The city would just spend it on something else. The problem with taxes in the city is 70% that live in the city do not pay taxes. That is what needs to be changed.
Day after Day after Day no real fires, but Jim Ireton and Jake Day believe everything Richard "Fatso" Hopeless says and want to pay for over 60 paid firemen. They want to extend the Federal fire grant that paid for 12 additional firemen for 2 years which is going to expire soon. Hopeless(I refuse to call him chief because he wouldn't make a pimple on a real fire chiefs butt)claims they can limit any fire to one room only, but in reality they let an entire building burn down in their own back yard and it was a small building at that. They saw it burning and responded way before it was dispatched and they still let it burn down. Proves the paid firemen are almost worthless and the volunteer firemen in the County can handle the real fire calls. Get rid of the paid firemen and let the volunteers handle the fire calls. Make EMS a separate department and you will find EMS is actually self sufficient.
ReplyDeleteWhat is funny is the call to assist Mardela, the volunteers were given the chance to respond and take the tanker. Guess what not one showed up. Guess the volunteers can handle all the calls right? So what happens if there is no career fire crew, and they fail to get out on a fire with victims trapped? Why not have the fire crews as an insurance policy.
ReplyDeleteI think if most people actually found out the time difference between a paid duty crew responding and a volunteer only response was they would change their tune pretty quick.
DeleteA paid fire crew strives to be in gear and out the door within 2 minutes of when the call goes out. The average response time for a volunteer crew is around 5-7minutes from the time the call goes out to the time the fire apparatus actually leaves the station.
Then no one ever takes into account that besides the Salisbury stations, not one single station in Wicomico county run more than 400 fire/rescue/assist (fire app response) calls per year. Yet each of the three Salisbury stations run 1000-1500 each year. The average county fire department has 50-70 volunteers (15-20 who actually respond regularly), and that's for 150-400 calls. Can you imagine how many volunteers Salisbury would need to handle the 4000-5000 (fire app response) calls they run each year.
Then take into account that just last week a wicomico county fire department got toned out for a house fire (along with 2 other stations) yet couldn't get a single fire truck/engine out the door because none of their driver/engineer qualified volunteers were available to drive nor pump the engine.
That is the problem the public is not educated enough about the fire service. They also think if the career members were gone their taxes would go down. The city would just spend it on something else. The problem with taxes in the city is 70% that live in the city do not pay taxes. That is what needs to be changed.
ReplyDelete8:21 AM how do 70% live in the city but do not pay taxes?
ReplyDeleteI kinda wondered that myself, maybe 20% as in those on government assistance. But in reality their landlord is still paying property taxes.
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