SFRD E-9

The "New" Stamford Fire Department finally has a Chief appointed. http://www.thehour.com/stamford_times/news/mayor-names-conte-as-chief-of-the-newly-formed-stamford/article_04ac7242-59e4-11e2-904a-001a4bcf6878.html

Let's see if it even makes it back to the factory!

The old Mack is back and is currently at the Fire Departments Maintenance Garage. It has been sitting for 2 years as the PD never used it. It needs a little TLC and then maybe a quick paint job then i'm sure it will be back in service.

Nothing new here in almost 3 weeks! Whats going on? Since the city hired 23 new SFRD Fire Fighters things have been real quiet!

Like I said in my post above and I want to reiterate to everyone. This is just MY own opinion! Matter of fact I won't even call it an opinion or how it "should" be. These are just my views based on 27 years of experience from having been a volunteer and a career fire fighter in two combination departments. Now don't get me wrong, I have been at calls way back in the day when fists were thrown between volly's and paid guys. I think most of these fights were because of the ego and attitude thing. Some may of been over something that someone did or didn't do right or wrong. But again because of that old ego and attitude thing arguments were started in stead of letting cooler heads prevail and fix the problem at hand and worry about the pissing later which really should have been figuring out what went wrong and finding a solution to the problem. I give a lot of credit to two paid guys from Danbury for ending the majority of the issues between the paid and volunteer departments. One is the current chief of Greenwich, Peter J. Siecienski who was one of the career training officers . He was one of the guys who helped to create what they call the Stop Light System which is a way off identifying who is who and their training level at a glance on the fire scene. Before this time you had to have three fully interior ffs on the engine before it could respond allowing it to match the career engines. Because volunteer numbers in Danbury were dropping and once a guy got into his 50s, 60s, etc some guys didn't want to maintain their interior status therefore putting them off the machine forever. Hence forth the Stop Light System: RED LIGHT: Fire Ground support only YELLOW LIGHT: Exterior Fire Fire Fighting GREEN LIGHT: Interior Fire Fighter Now under each of these headings where other qualification like a driver license has. You can be a pump operator, fire police (yes Danbury has a great fire police unit), EMT etc. This ultimately allowed for the response guidelines to change allowing for 2 Green Light and either 1 Red or Yellow Light as long as they had a driver/pump operator qualification. This allowed those "older" guys back into active status or anyone else that didn't want to be interior. I believe the background of the I.D. tags have the appropriate color for identification (been awhile and not sure if this still how it's done). At this point in time is when the Career Training Officer began taking over the responsibility of providing the yearly refreshers and other main required drills for the volunteer fire fighters. What they ended up doing was setting up quarterly drills. The drill schedule was handed out at the beginning of the year allowing people to schedule their time to be able to attend. The same drill was run for the career guys as well the volunteers. It took place over several weekends of each quarter allowing plenty of time for everyone to be able to hit one of the dates. At the same time it allowed for better training record keeping. At the end of each quarter a report was generated of the attendance and handed out to the volunteer company officers. Any volunteer who did not make one of the required drills was taken off active response until he or she made up what was required. This really helps to keep OSHA off your back! It also alleviated those responsibilities from the volunteer officers as well as the record keeping and reporting. The other guy was Jim Thorne who took over as training officer from Pete as he moved up the ladder. Jim (nor Pete) never had that ego/attitude thing (at least not that I ever saw) although he would always tell it like it was. Jim really brought the training together to finish what Pete had started. He taught and treated you as a fire fighter. It didn't matter if you were paid or volunteer because he new that if and when the "Sh_t" hit the fan, he wanted to make sure you new what you were doing and that peoples lives, civilian, paid and volunteer were on the line. It was a no BS approach and I really liked the way he taught. I have tried to carry this through in my career. I don't care if your paid or volunteer either. To me the bottom line is if you are going to be involved in Public Safety then play the game by the rules. Don't pad the truth, rosters, abilities, etc. and make sure that the training is the real deal. We all know that volunteerism is on the downslide and has been for many years. It's documented by The National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC). Most importantly is no one is to blame. It's the sign of the times and the economy. We must, especially the Volunteer Fire Departments, embrace this fact and work out the best situation to mitigate the problem. For me, my above post can assist in this. It's not the end all be all but it "Could" be a start. Just like an addiction, the first step in recovery is to recognize and except the fact that you have a problem!

I'll throw MY thoughts in here on Pete's question and I mean mine only. No rumors here. I will use Danbury for an example as it is close and similar as far as a combination department. This is all assuming career staff are spread throughout the entire city. This is also based on the fact that like in Danbury, the volunteer pieces of equipment responding are staffed buy a fully qualified crew. In Danbury that is driver/operator and at least 2 fully certified interior FF's (there is an exception to this for tankers and the two squad companies which are air and lighting units). Danbury Volunteer's don't really do EMS with the exception of one company and I'm not sure if they still do. Example: A call goes out for an Automatic Alarm in a district that a volunteer department is in. Both career and the appropriate volunteer unit/s are dispatched. Who ever is the first on scene gives the initial size up and proceeds to investigate. They report their findings to the responding deputy chief. If it turns out to be a fire or some other cause then that first due piece does what it has to until the rest of the responding assignment arrives. If a volunteer "senior" officer is first on scene then they will assume command until the deputy arrives. Once he does then they will meet and either transfer command or do what the two decide is best. If more volunteer FFs show up in their private vehicles, then they would report to the command post and get an assignment (accountability, tagging in etc.) As far as this type of call it's as simple as that. No big deal. EMS, Rescue, MVA calls are a little different story. As it sits right now having two engines, a fly car, 901 and an ambulance responding to a basic ems call is ridiculous, unnecessary and dangerous to the public. If the volunteers are to going to respond to them then they need to part of the CAD system. What I mean by this if there is a certified crew hanging out at the fire house and has enough manpower to properly staff an apparatus then they should contact dispatch and have that unit put into the system so the CAD system can automatically suggest them to the appropriate call. This way not only will they be dispatched within their own district but will be utilized throughout the entire system/city if necessary. This should make that "CERT" issue/concern go away. Now that I think about this as i'm typing, this part should have been implemented a long time ago! By doing the above, for an example, TOR has their rescue staffed with "certified" personnel and have called dispatch and are put into the CAD as available. A call comes in for an MVA on the parkway. Their rescue is dispatched instead of Rescue1 leaving them available if needed elsewhere. I'm gonna stop here because I could go on and on with different scenarios, departments etc. The bottom line is it can work. There will have to be a little give and take everywhere. Anyone who has been in the "system" for a while, and no offense to the newer guys but I mean more than 20 years, know what changes have taken place. The old days are long gone and we need to be more flexible to stay viable. Training, SOG's, SOP's, medical physicals etc all have to become standard. This way there is no "he said she said". In Danbury, the yearly refreshers, and main drills are set up and run by the Career training officer. The career staff and volunteer staff go through these same drills. This way there is continuity and everyone is on the same page. This also takes some of the burden off of the volunteer officers and allows them make better use of what time they have to give to their department. Again this is MY $.02 and Mine only. It's no secret. I grew up in the Danbury Vol. Fire Department and am proud of it. I spent 14 years there as an active member holding numerous officers positions before getting hired as a career fire fighter almost 13 years ago. I am glad to have a lot of my training come from the career guys there. Most of those guys back then where truly seasoned veterans and had "been there done that" and passed on to us what they learned along the way. I am lucky to have had the unique experience of coming from a combination system so I understand both sides. I also am lucky because when I first got involved in the fire service we were still using just long coats, 3/4 boots and a helmet. No hoods or pants. You were a "puke" if you chose to where an airpack to a car fire or dumpster fire etc. I got to see a lot of changes and the majority of them are for the good. I truly believe if everyone puts their egos and attitudes aside this new system can and will work!

From the Stamford Patch: http://stamford.patch.com/articles/stamford-charter-revision-committee-votes-to-favor-unified-fire-dept#photo-9702189

Do yourself a favor and put an application in at Danbury Hospital, Vin Tech, AMR or one of the other services.

They still ride on the back of garbage trucks in Stamford, CT. See it every day I go into work! There's a reason why Fire Departments stopped this practice in the late 80's.

Cogs not for nothing but you haven't been around Stamford in a long time and I am sure you are only hearing ONE side of the story. Yes, the SFRD guys and the volunteers HAVE been working well together. Once and if you get back in town, go out on calls and see for yourself instead of listening to others and by what you may have read in posts. I have talked with some of the volunteers that agree with me and asked them why they don't say something to there respective departments. They are afraid they will be alienated for speaking out against the departments "Ideology". I think the volunteers should have a vote with several suggestions on it as to the current status and what they should do and it should be done by secret ballot. This way no one feels pressured one way or another which I believe has already happened. Most of the guys just want to be able to do what they always have and get on with it.

Well Put! Things would have been exactly the way they were before the merger with the exception of the patch on the shoulders of the paid guys, and the amount of guys on the rigs (more of them). The problem was there were some of our so called "Union Brothers" feeding the volunteers misinformation about the big bad union and the SFRD. Turn of River was afraid that it would have a "Springdale" on their hands. The only problem is the Springdale problem was started by Springdale's own Chief, not the SFRD guys. Ask any of the Turn of River guys how things have been going working with SFRD on calls. Everyone works together and treat each other with respect. Now if only the Upper management at TOR will listens to the guys that actually go to calls and not the ones who sit in the back bay smoking cigars and stirring the pot and rumor mill, maybe we can put this to bed and move on. They would have all their funding, respond to calls, and the SFRD engines would have a real home.

Yes there was a "Major" fire of a large house. Not much left. First due engine from LRFD station 1 with one guy stayed out on the road (No size up!). Second due engine from LRFD station 2 with one guy drove by the hydrant and pulled in the driveway. One volunteer officer showed up. That was it on a Saturday night at approx. 9:00pm. As of this past July first, the Long Ridge Chief cancelled all the automatic mutual aid they used to received on all fire calls which stumped everyone else ! Looks like it bit them in the "can". We all knew it would happen, just a matter of time. I'm sure the home owner won't be happen when they find out this information!