Bnechis

If counties all over this country can run at a county wide level then why can't dept's in NY? One county in So. Caroline thats as rural if not more so than dutchess did so and within 5 years moved 90% of the county from ISO 9 to a 4. All in areas with NO HYDRANTS. thats a 40% reduction in insurance premiums for every property for the next 15 years. Great Britan consolidate 450 depts. down to 50 in 3 countries, many with large areas of farmland. They were forced to do it because of WWII, but found it worked so well they never went back. It can be done and done well, if you want it.

Now I know why nothing ever gets done in ALBANY! I wonder if you added them all up would it save money to actually pay firefighters?

Yes there are more volunteers and VFD's. The 10 Largest career depts in NYS protect 55% of the population. There are another 90 career and combo depts. And you're right this is not about career or volunteer, its about who should pay for fire protection.

The tax payers of mamaroneck village are required by law to pay for your turnouts...since you are protecting them. This legislation would require the citizens of NYC, Yonkers, Buffalo and Albany etc. to pay for your gas. If fuel is needed to maintain the level of protection, then the local community should pay for it.

I agree. I pay for a career fire dept. those communities with volunteer depts can provide fuel to members if they want to support them. Why should my state tax dollars be used to support VFD's when I already pay for fire protection? Is it still allowable to write off the cost of volunteering? It was in the early 1980's. If it is this is truly political spin. Also this is being proposed by a politician from a 100% volunteer county. He would love to see more money coming from other counties to support his.

Moose, normally that would be a good idea, except the CEO(s) are currently under federal investigation & or indictment for a number of much more serious issues than whats going on in the FD. I don't think you will see them showing up anytime soon.

I think the real question is what do you get in a 1/2 million $ boat that you dont get in one thats 1/2 that price? About 10 yrs ago, our PD bought a surplus USCG 44' motor lifeboat with a fire pump, metal hull (and it came from the great lakes, so no salt water till it got here). It needed very minor work and was inservice within 2 weeks of arrival. Total cost $40,000.

The only ones who seem to get all fired up are the firefighters. Has anyone considered that central station alarm companies are selling a service of protection (fire & break-in) and they advertise how they will protect you by professionally dispatching emergency responders (that you've already paid for). Some communities bill the home owners for unwarrented alarms, but with 30% - 40% of all calls for Police, Fire & I've fallen but I can't get up (but they are not home) calls. Maybe its time to pass legislation that the central station alarm companies should be paying for our services when they send us to faulty alarms (particularly for the 3rd, 10th or 1,000th time....)

Interesting that everyone points to St. Loius, but does anyone know whats behind it? 15 years ago (or so) SLFD implimented the total quint concept and radically cut down on the number of companies. This resulted in longer responses. They had a push on to maintain the response time (Dont know if it was formal or not). THen the number of vehicle accidents when wy up, they then decided to do on the quite and "on the quite" calls are not "counted" in response time stats. automatic alarms, Strongly Agree sprinkler alarms, Agree natural gas leaks, outside agree, inside...consider the Scarsdale incident (1 more minute and a 1/2 doz. people would have been killed) wires down, Agree calls for manpower, Agree (for what?) flush jobs, Agree lockouts, Agree carbon monoxide detector alarms, no symptoms agree, with disagree rubbish, weeds, and Agree as long as no exposures dumpster fires. Agree as long as no exposures Another way to consider slowing things down if unsure if its an emergency or not is continue the 1st engine in emergecny mode and all others go 10-20 (normal nonemergency driving). If its real, you'll get there fast and can step up everyone else, will only delay the 2nd due by a minute but reduces the risks.

In NYS those funds were already paid to an outside investment firm who sits on them earning interest and charging a fee to manage them, its unclear if the dept. ever see's it in our lifetime. And you never will. Too much money has been invested in too many communities betting on it will work. But before additional communities spend tax money on this, shouldn't the LOSAP programs be able to show the taxpayers that it actually does what they are saying it will?

2 reasons; 1) the majority of burglar alarms are false or in error, 2) the ones that are not they want to sneak up to catch the perp. About 2 years ago we looked at are statistics for AFA and found that over 25 years we did about 19,000 alarms less than 10 were working fires (I dont remember the number that were minor fires...like food on the stove) the extra 2 minutes on the minor ones would have made very little difference. During the same time we discovered more than 10 working fires by driving up the street (coming back from calls, out doing BI, training, food shopping, etc.) and noticing the flames shooting out of a window...... It appears that luck works better than an AFA.......Why get hurt, killed or hurt someone else going to an AFA, when 99% or more are not real emergencies?

Since the time to do the math is longer than the time for the AC unit to hit the ground (or anyone in its path). Your only hope is that someone (including you) did a proper and continues to do a proper size-up and stays out of its path.

Its simple mathmatics only if it work, if you pay into LOSAP and the vol rolls still drop off, where does the money go? and you still have to bring in career. I have yet to find any study that can show that LOSAP programs actually recruit or retain members. Many in other threads have claimed they do, but no one can point to any proof.

Red Cross

ISO ratings are like an open book test, if you score between 90 & 100% you get a 1, 80-90% is a 2, 70-80% is a 3, 60-70% is a 4 and 50-60% is a 5 So of the above listed ratings, Ten of eighteen depts got either a D minus or an F on an open book test. Since we don't know why a community got the score it did, you can not always make assumptions; i.e. Yonkers got a 3 with the best manning...but did the water system hold them back....yep. Some combo depts, that are running with 6 or 8 members and no longer have volunteers did about the same as some VFD's that turn out good numbers. You also need to add divergence. This deducts up to 20% from either the FD's 50% or the Water Supplies 40%. If you have the best water in the world but no FD you get 0% for FD and reduce the water supplies 40% by 20% and visversa. While the ISO website lists the above info, but the ISO FSRS (fire service rating schedule) which you can buy from them and is how they actually calculate the rating, lists manpower being open ended, meaning more ff's = more points. Also you only need (according to the rating) to send 2 engines and a truck (or service co) but nothing prevents sending more. Also the FSRS wants 36 responders on 3 rigs. the rating goes back to a time when there was only 4 seats and the back step.

Its 15 unless you put an arial into service then its 16. THis is for a 2,000 sq ft. two story private dwelling without a basement and no exposures. Larger structures, high life hazards (Hospitals, Schools, Nursing Homes, Multiple Dwellings) and high hazard locations (Factories, Chemical Storage, Special Properties) require additional personnel in the 1st Alarm Response. How many buildings in Westchester are this size or smaller. One of the chiefs told me, thats the size of our carrage houses (garage w/a 1 bedroom apt. over it). a. Incident Commander* 1 ff b. Pump Operator 1 ff c. Attack & Backup Lines 4 ff d. Line Support/Hydrant etc. 2 ff e. SAR Team 2 ff f. Vent Team 2 ff g. Aerial Operator 1 ff h. IRIC Team 2 ff * (5.2.1.2.5) IC shall have an aid assigned & is not counted in the above numbers Total 16 ff’s For a working fire, this list does not include a Safety Officer and 2 additional firefighter’s to upgrade the IRIC to the required FAST team. The aerial operator needs to be 2 firefighters if the unit is a tower ladder. 8 of our 16 ladders are tower ladders.

ISO's manning uses an average. So a Dept that gets 50 volunteers at nights and weekends, but only 4 mid day might actually make the 36 (average) depending on the number of calls at those times. Its not perfect, but insurance ratings are based on statistics and not what is needed on a specific call. They also require more personnel to cover a response since most depts do not know how many will actually show up.

Thats there minimum level (not including water supply personnel for those who do not have a municipal system...ie hydrants) You get points for every ff that shows up, the more the better the rating.

In a 100% Volunteer Response, ISO reqires a minimum or 36 volunteers and an IC on every fire call. If you have 4 career ff's responding, then ISO wants 24 volunteers and an IC to respond with the 4 career. If Peekskill FD has 40 interior volunteers, is it likely that they can get 24 to every call?

I'll see if I can find them. I never had links, I had hard copies.

Please explain this. 1) if you reduce the amount of tax collected (by giving a credit) you have to either cut spending or raise taxes somewhere else. 2) How does it save NYS money? (It may save depts. and local government money, if it actually work and they do not have to hire, but it does not save NYS anything). How many ff's does the State Government have as employee's of the state?

How is this a great deal for NYS? NYS does not provide fire protection, this deal is to help VFD's. It takes money away from other state programs. If a Community with volunteers wants to provide benefits to its volunteers good for them, but if NYS does this it means that the 90% of NYS citizens (those who are protected by career fire service) have to foot the bill. They are paying taxes to support there FD's and now are being asked to help fund communities that apparently need extra help to retain volunteers and clearly are unwilling to support there own dept.

Who believes this? 1) A New York State Legislative Commission on State-Local Relations report (New York’s Fire Protection System: Services in Transition, 1988) noted that a study commissioned by the National Volunteer Fire Council concluded that “enhanced benefits did not seem to be a major criteria for retention in many volunteer departments.” 2) Ten years later and that conclusion has not changed. In another study this time by the USFA and the NVFC (Recruitment and Retention in the Volunteer Fire Service: Problems and Solutions, USFA & NVFC, 1998) concluded that while direct monetary incentives can help with retention, “… they are not the best method to retain members. Departments that use direct monetary incentives often find themselves having to deal with squabbles by members over money…” 3) An Erie County study (“Recruitment and Retention of Volunteer Firefighters in Erie County, New York” 11/98) reported that Length of Service award programs, aside from having high startup costs, appear to retain members for a couple of years and do not interest the younger members who are decades away from collecting benefits. It appears that these programs award long term members who are already committed to the department. 4) The New York State Comptroller’s Office in July 2001 (A Report on Volunteer Firefighter Length of Service Award Programs, NYS Comptroller, July 2001.), released a study that assessed the success that LOSAP had in recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters. The study concluded that aside from an initial spike in membership following establishment of a LOSAP, the programs might not be effective in recruiting and retaining volunteers. Can anyone show any study that shows that LOSAP works to recruit or retain volunteers? Those who say its a reward is fine, but thats not what this is beingsold as.

The ability to get more grants is a given, there are many grants for law enforcement and very few for fire. Fire Act Grant (which MVFD has recieved) Safer (which is a very poor grant, particularly when compared to the COPS grant. SAFER gets 20% of COPS) Fire Prevention Grant (which MVFD has recieved) Thats it. (unless you are in a rural area, and even with horses (sorry Chris) MV is not rural). There are also UASI & SUASP Grants that go to the major cities in Westchester. But they are for many progams (including Law Enforcement, OEM, EMS, & FD...but very limited in what you can get for FD...i.e no suppression stuff).

It is a shame that EMS agencies place so little concern for the well being of their staff. Is PPE expensive...Yes, but agencies who make this a priority instead of some other "extras" are protecting their people, the patients and complying with state and federal (PESH & OSHA) law. How do you know if it is needed, prior to your arrival? You don't thats why PPE is put on before you arrival. Once onscene if its not on it never gets on. Most ff's put turnouts on before arrival. Cops don't wait to arrive to put there vest on, is it overkill on most calls? I don't need to buckle my seat belt until just before the crash.......... 1st Maybe the patient should be given more protection. 2nd Since we teach rescuer safety is primary, then yes EMS should have more protection than the patient. They are already injured, if we get injured the care for them is delayed. 3rd the majority of MVA's include poping a door, but once we start cutting there is a major potential for sharp edges, glass and other hazards, since you don't know what the MVA will be until you get there, you need to have PPE prior.