Countywide EMS Consolidation

[61MACKBR1 222]

The "SMART MOVE" would be to do what a very large percentage of COUNTIES do throughout this country. And that is to have a COUNTY RUN EMS and FIRE SERVICE (Consolidated) and everything run by the County, with the Operations 100% controlled out of Valhalla (60 Control) and the heck with all of the City/Town/Village Run Fire and EMS Services. Until such time as everyone in Westchester County wakes up and realizes that the HOME RUN and BACK ROOM POLITICS (tied to individual UNIONS) are causing 99.99% of the headaches in each and every municipality here in Westchester County, all of this "Yo-Yo'ing" of quality of service, complaints about Mutual Aid and other nonsense, will continue to happen.

ONE SYSTEM, ONE OPERATION, ONE EMERGENCY SERVICE OPERATION (County Run), ONE SET OF UNIFORM TRAINING REQUIREMENTS FOR ALL FIREFIGHTERS, EMT's and PARAMEDICS, AND ONE COUNTY RUN OPERATION (with one 'set' of Officers and Command Personnel, overseeing all Fire and EMS Operations throughout the County)

Until then, this county will continue to be in CHAOS

[AFS1970 504]

More and more I have become a proponent of taking EMS out of the private sector. Despite being generally a small government type of guy, there are some services which have to be part of the government. There are many issues that come with a privatized service both for the community and the employees. It is also interesting that while we all seem to accept private EMS, if you suggested privatizing the police or even the fire service (any more than it is now) there would be a huge outcry.

No this being county or city based would depend largely on the specifics of the community. I don;t think any one is better or worse than the other. Any argument you can make about County being better because it is bigger, could be extended to a single statewide service or even a single national service. I think that would definitely be treading into government overreach.

[LTNRFD 266]

The "SMART MOVE" would be to do what a very large percentage of COUNTIES do throughout this country. And that is to have a COUNTY RUN EMS and FIRE SERVICE (Consolidated) and everything run by the County, with the Operations 100% controlled out of Valhalla (60 Control) and the heck with all of the City/Town/Village Run Fire and EMS Services. Until such time as everyone in Westchester County wakes up and realizes that the HOME RUN and BACK ROOM POLITICS (tied to individual UNIONS) are causing 99.99% of the headaches in each and every municipality here in Westchester County, all of this "Yo-Yo'ing" of quality of service, complaints about Mutual Aid and other nonsense, will continue to happen.

ONE SYSTEM, ONE OPERATION, ONE EMERGENCY SERVICE OPERATION (County Run), ONE SET OF UNIFORM TRAINING REQUIREMENTS FOR ALL FIREFIGHTERS, EMT's and PARAMEDICS, AND ONE COUNTY RUN OPERATION (with one 'set' of Officers and Command Personnel, overseeing all Fire and EMS Operations throughout the County)

Until then, this county will continue to be in CHAOS

For someone from the State of Rhode Island, you always seem to have a strong opinion on how we should run things down here in Westchester. Not every location is broke down here. Yes many areas would benefit from a merger/consolidation. But at what cost? If Larchmont was to be merged with N.R. who would pay for the extra firefighters needed to man the Larchmont station?? Larchmont could only man 1 rig with their current manpower. Is N.R. suppose to provide the extra manpower? My taxes are high enough and I'm not willing to subsidize Larchmont so they can have adequate fire protection. I want MY dept to be available for My family and MY property. Not Larchmont's or Mount Vernon's or Eastchester's, etc. They can have assistances every now and then for the major stuff, but for everyday stuff I want my first and second due engine and truck available for MY house.

[STAT213 332]

So, by your argument, county run systems like those in Maryland, Virginia, Florida and California are failures due to costs and subsidies of smaller communities. Hmmm. Really?

You wouldn't be paying for larchmont to have fire protection equal to that of Yonkers, you would be paying to have your fire protection. All pay the same for the same coverage. That's like saying one neighborhood in Boston should pull out of the BFD because they don't like that from time to time their engine leaves to cover calls in another district.

That's why the mess that exists now, exists. If you consolidate all the resources, the system becomes more efficient. Is it THAT hard to see? It's managed and run as a SYSTEM, not a bunch of independent entities.

If you live on the border of say Yonkers and what used to be a volunteer town, you may just get your second engine or ladder WAY faster than you used to, because it's not coming from the other side of Yonkers, but from the next CLOSEST fire house.

How exactly is this bad? Uniform training, uniform standards and staffed fire stations. None of those are bad.

[LTNRFD 266]

So, by your argument, county run systems like those in Maryland, Virginia, Florida and California are failures due to costs and subsidies of smaller communities. Hmmm. Really?

You wouldn't be paying for larchmont to have fire protection equal to that of Yonkers, you would be paying to have your fire protection. All pay the same for the same coverage. That's like saying one neighborhood in Boston should pull out of the BFD because they don't like that from time to time their engine leaves to cover calls in another district.

That's why the mess that exists now, exists. If you consolidate all the resources, the system becomes more efficient. Is it THAT hard to see? It's managed and run as a SYSTEM, not a bunch of independent entities.

If you live on the border of say Yonkers and what used to be a volunteer town, you may just get your second engine or ladder WAY faster than you used to, because it's not coming from the other side of Yonkers, but from the next CLOSEST fire house.

How exactly is this bad? Uniform training, uniform standards and staffed fire stations. None of those are bad.

I never said that departments like the ones in Fla., MD.,Va., etc are failures. Departments like those were establish due to a lack of any fire protection or not enough due to a growing community. Most were due to post WWII development, not to consolidate existing departments. They were able to plan and construct fire stations in ideal locations for timely responses to the entire area. These were areas that had little or no community services to start with so the counties were providing most of these services so the tax rates were equal across the board. In Westchester there are communities that have been around (providing services) for over 100 years. It would be easy to do what those other counties are doing if Westchester was a new developing county. Palm Beach County F.D. (Fla) was organized in the mid 1980's due to massive development in Palm Beach County west of I-95 where there was little or no fire protection. Fairfax County F.D. (Va) was organized in 1949 to assist the existing vol. depts. and didn't really grow until the post WWII development exploded in the late 1950's and it wasn't until the 1970's that they built new stations to handle the growth of the county.

The Pace study on consolidation talks about how to consolidate and how many personal are needed, but they have not done a comprehensive financial study to see who pays what. That question has been asked on these forums many times without any answers.

My point to my previous post was asking 61MACKBR1 why he is so worried about what is going on in Westchester. He seems to have a dog in this fight. And I say the same to you from Derry, N.H., It seems more out of county people on here have a strong opinions how Westchester should be run. When you can tell me that you were part of a new county consolidation program in YOUR state, and it worked, then please jump in and gives us some insight as to how we can make it work. Not just jump on these forums and say CONSOLIDATE IS THE BEST.

[61MACKBR1 222]

I never said that departments like the ones in Fla., MD.,Va., etc are failures. Departments like those were establish due to a lack of any fire protection or not enough due to a growing community. Most were due to post WWII development, not to consolidate existing departments. They were able to plan and construct fire stations in ideal locations for timely responses to the entire area. These were areas that had little or no community services to start with so the counties were providing most of these services so the tax rates were equal across the board. In Westchester there are communities that have been around (providing services) for over 100 years. It would be easy to do what those other counties are doing if Westchester was a new developing county. Palm Beach County F.D. (Fla) was organized in the mid 1980's due to massive development in Palm Beach County west of I-95 where there was little or no fire protection. Fairfax County F.D. (Va) was organized in 1949 to assist the existing vol. depts. and didn't really grow until the post WWII development exploded in the late 1950's and it wasn't until the 1970's that they built new stations to handle the growth of the county.

The Pace study on consolidation talks about how to consolidate and how many personal are needed, but they have not done a comprehensive financial study to see who pays what. That question has been asked on these forums many times without any answers.

My point to my previous post was asking 61MACKBR1 why he is so worried about what is going on in Westchester. He seems to have a dog in this fight. And I say the same to you from Derry, N.H., It seems more out of county people on here have a strong opinions how Westchester should be run. When you can tell me that you were part of a new county consolidation program in YOUR state, and it worked, then please jump in and gives us some insight as to how we can make it work. Not just jump on these forums and say CONSOLIDATE IS THE BEST.

No "Dog Fight" as you call it LTNRFD, just simply pointing out, as professionally as "STAT213" did with his response, that it make all the sense in the world to have a Consolidated County Run Fire and EMT Service, just like other MAJOR (and Populated) Counties throughout the United States have successfully in place today, that has saved taxpayers a tremendous amounts of money annually (Look at Montgomery County Maryland and Gwinnett County Georgia, for 2 examples that have worked perfectly, if you, as you have 'Personally" asked for, as examples for you to use as a guideline to see how others have done it successfully). It is simply a "Political" battle between politicians who continue to fight to save the "Good Old System" that has been broken for over 100 years, because they don't want to upset certain groups that could impact their political position within their local municipality; as well as Unions, who rather keep 100% controls over their small piece of the pie, rather than having a UNIFIED COUNTY PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTERS ASSOCIATION UNION, who would have more to gain, by having a larger SINGLE group to ensure equal rights and a single negotiated contract, which would benefit the firefighters individually more than what they have today (but these local Union Leaders are fearful that if there is only 1 single union, that these Union Leaders would lose their jobs (because you would only need to have 1 head of the County Professional Firefighters Union and 1 head of the County Professional Firefighters Officers Union). Again, no "DOG FIGHT" or personal agenda on my part, just making my opinion on what makes sense to do (Take all of the Egos and Politics out of the issues)

Edited January 9, 2016 by 61MACKBR1

[LTNRFD 266]

that it make all the sense in the world to have a Consolidated County Run Fire and EMT Service, just like other MAJOR (and Populated) Counties throughout the United States have successfully in place today, that has saved taxpayers a tremendous amounts of money annually (Look at Montgomery County Maryland and Gwinnett County Georgia

Again no one has shown any financials as to the "tremendous savings" a Westchester County run fire department would save the tax payers. All the buzz words and phrases sound good, but the bottom line is MONEY.....What is the cost for this great service to the citizens. Show me where I will at least maintain the same level of fire protection and not cost me any more money. I will even say you can raise my taxes if the savings to my homeowners insurance goes down by the same amount.

It is simply a "Political" battle between politicians who continue to fight to save the "Good Old System" that has been broken for over 100 years, because they don't want to upset certain groups that could impact their political position within their local municipality; as well as Unions, who rather keep 100% controls over their small piece of the pie, rather than having a UNIFIED COUNTY PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTERS ASSOCIATION UNION, who would have more to gain, by having a larger SINGLE group to ensure equal rights and a single negotiated contract, which would benefit the firefighters individually more than what they have today (but these local Union Leaders are fearful that if there is only 1 single union, that these Union Leaders would lose their jobs (because you would only need to have 1 head of the County Professional Firefighters Union and 1 head of the County Professional Firefighters Officers Union).

The three career fire districts in the Town of Greenburgh have formed 1 union, and they can't get the powers to be to make it 1 fire district because of the inequality of taxables in the district. The areas with a lower tax rate due to more properties that pay their fair share don't want to subsidies the areas that have a greater amount of tax exempt properties.

Again all the great models in the U.S. of consolidated fire or EMS systems have a different property tax situation. You are comparing apples to pineapples, they sound similar, but are two totally different items.

The bottom line is the bottom line.....Show me the money.