spin_the_wheel

The all volunteer dept that gets out 99% of the time do they have in house crews? Do the volunteer companies in this area respond from home? I understand the whole thing about tradition and history with each individual dept./company, but after reading these posts for some time, it would seem that if these volunteer depts.s want to keep their areas and not become just an overhaul and bottle refill group they should put aside their ego's and all combine. Im not familiar with the area but maybe keep 2 or 3 of the stations pool the manpower and apparatus and create one all volunteer dept. What seems like will happen is that in time 2 or 3 of these volunteer dept.s may finally give in, or be forced to give up their areas, once it's gone it's gone for good. It would be in the best interest of all these dept.s to combine into one strong force. Do it while YOU can control the outcome, otherwise if someone else does it for you I doubt it will be the way you want it. I know of a few dept.s/companies in Lancaster County Pa. who have combined and it seems to work fine.

Who plows the snow....I hope not on duty Firefighters? And why no LIME, state bid truck I guess.

Elmont NY's 1947 Mack, the box was later transplanted onto a 57 B chasis. in qtrs. with Hook and Ladder co. #2 circa 1967.

Never ever be tempted no matter how easy it may look, to put the first attack line on the fire "through" the garage door opening. Always bring the line through the house and attack from the inside of home. You are protecting the rest of the structure as well as protecting the crews who will do the searches. Making entry through the garage may look like an easy fix but there is always the chance of the garage door coming down while you are making entry into the space or working inside, trapping the crew or cutting off water supply. Who knows what clutter and hazzards may be in the garage area. Attacking form an interior space gives you a safer area to operate from, you have the use of a doorway and a door hopefully to aide you of things go south quick. Not to mention pushing the fire away form the rest of the structure, and if done right you have that nice large garage door opening to push everything out of.

Anyone have pics of the new Mamaroneck station for H&L and Mamaro? Thanks.

Is the present location the location of the Firehouse when this rig was active? Are there many old retired Firehouses in Ossining?

Not those things alone but the addition of 2 bays for the space and all the other building codes and OSHA regulations they have to follow to build this puts it up there in cost. Hey at least the board is holding meetings for the public to see whats what. Like I said before its up to the voters of the district. Oh and Nassau and Suffolk didnt almost go bankrupt because of the FD's. Yeah there were a few bad apples in the FD's but it was exposed and the residents are kept up to date with things better then they ever were.

How many paid f/f's would the town need if they went this route...it may be a savings in the begining, but in the end I think the cost would be more. Figure 60 f/f's and Officers, at $100,000 each thats salary and benifits, and thats on the low scale to start. Not counting overtime, pay increases you will be over the 6 mil and never looking back, the salaries will always go up. No union is going to say ok we will take less pay to help the taxpayers. The same union will be asking for firehouse upgrades as well in the future.

Well....I guess your right but lets see what the article stated ....cramped room on the app. floor while the members are gearing up, an upgrade to a "gear" room away from the rigs, which is now required in all new Firehouses, outdated heating and electric, an upgrade with elevator and handicapped accessible bathrooms since this is a public building, all in a1959 building that has not had an upgrade ever. OK you win they dont deserve it they NEED it. Be Safe.

I thought Bedford Hills was one of the more active all volunteer depts in Westchester that had a good response time, good training ect.........if so dont they deserve an upgrade? In the end it will come to the taxpayers who vote on it.

Who has 10 Chiefs?

Good luck, sounds like you need the upgrade.

Sad to see the old hose 4 qtrs meet its fate in the way it did, and with all the talk of making 1 large house for at least 5 companies, the face of the Peekskill FD will be very different in a few years. That said anyone have pictures of all the in service stations? Thanks be safe Brothers.

Many times departments that run as individual companies do not have individual company tones to alert their radios, and the alarm is toned out as a "general". As the Chief said just because every company gets alerted, that does not mean all 8 companies will get to the scene. Plus if a second alarm comes in your ahead of the game, you have units on the road already saving time from a home response. Also we are not talking about a district that is 50sq. miles.

No the Chief does have control there are 3 Chiefs, elected from the 8 companies. This is their procedure for alarms, it works for them and the village they serve. This is a very large and strong all Volunteer Dept. What other Volunteer Dept. gets 2 tillers out for alarms. By the way they still use wooden ladders, has nothing to do with the topic but it's different for the East coast.

Thats not really true of tillers, there are many departments going back to the use of tillers that once used them, Philly is almost all tillers for truck companies, as well as a few getting a tiller for the first time and combining 2 units into one with all the storage posibilities, Eden Fire Company in lancaster Pa. for one, did away with their Heavy rescue and replaced their old Ladder with a TruCQue. CA. has been running the quint tiller for some time now with much success. If you have the manpower and Chauff's to run one its the best straight stick choice.

Was hoping to get there but couldnt, had our County parade that day as well.......any pics? Any extra t-shirts for sale?

The only report I have from the OFPC is an older one from 1995. A few interesting points, NYC makes up 40.7 of the states population so when you include FDNY into any survey its going to spike the results. In fact the reports from the OFPC always separate FDNY (nyc) from the rest of state when making their charts, stats ect.. That said, as for fires, the top 7 counties for all fires in 1995 (structure, Vehicle, and other fire) were Suffolk-9764, Erie-5802, Westchester-5394, Monroe-4911, Nassau 4808, Onondaga-2918, and orange-2689. I would say most of these Counties are Volunteer counties. i cant see how when its all said and done that 10% of career f/f's are putting out 80-90% of the fires. Top 5 Counties population wise, Suffolk-1,321,864, Nassau-1,287,348, Erie-968,532, Westchester-874,866, Onondaga-468,973. Again mostly Volunteer Counties. Bottom line is you can proabably sway your stats to strengthen any argument , no matter what side your trying to push, look at how politicians spin facts and figures.

Although you are correct FDNY is a case study to itself. Its population served #'s are so far from the norm that it inflates the 55% figure somewhat. Consider that the #2 population served is Buffalo with 328,123, you see how FDNY's million or so inflate the #'s. Do the math without FDNY and use the 11th career dept. The average population served of depts with all paid is only 47,408. My all Volunteer dept on Long Island serves 47,204 as per the 2000 census.. The fact is that career depts. make up a small part of the firefighting service in NY state. My #'s had 45 all career depts. and 47 mixed combo. Thats only 5% of the 1,824 fire depts. in NY State. And for the record I could care less about the gas reimbursement.

Are you counting FDNY and the population they serve into the 55%?

Im surprised they dont have a rep for bargaining. Nassau County is part of the CSEA and the Nassau County Fire Rescue Services which is made up of 2 divisions the Fire Marshals office and the Fire Communications office, both have a rep that sits down when contracts are being done. I believe Suffolk county is the same. I have no idea what it would take but there are more then enough dispatchers in NY state to form a pretty strong (numbers wise) separate dispatchers union.

Dont forget the salary range listed never includes night diff, holiday pay, Overtime that most dispatch centers have plenty of, emd pay if they do that, uniform allowance maybe....add 10,000 to each step is a good rule of thumb. Plus dont you guys at 60 work the 12 hour work chart, plenty of time off to do nothing, hang out at the firehouse and be a "day guy" or work another gig if you got one.

To bad Izzy I'll miss hearing you guys on 20.

Ok thanks for the Port Chester info I did not know they relocate an Engine. Is that staffed with 1 or 2 paid? As for Rye, the Volunteers have to be doing the job at a working fire because 4 paid men who have to opperate at the least 2 rigs could never work a fire with only 2 remaining firefighters, why not put all the paid staff on 1 engine and have the volunteers run the rest?

On a general alarm how does the system work? The 4 paid guys are all driving a rig? 3 Engines and a Ladder? 2 Engines and 2 Ladders? If this is the case they must be depending on the Volunteers to respond and do the Firefighting while the paid staff opperate the rigs, or do they hand off the rig to a qualified Volunteer? This is like the situation in Peekskill where its 6 guys all drivers of rigs. I think it would be better to hire maybe 1 or 2 more in Peekskill and combine the 8 on duty to man 1 Eng and 1 ladder and have the volnteers run the rest of the rigs. I have heard Peekskill has a strong Volunteer membership. I am in now way knocking a system what works for one does not for others, but I have always thought Port Chester should combine all the paid staff on one rig, as they have a strong Volunteer system as well to man the other rigs.