Bnechis

Government should be very mindful of how it spends taxpayer money. But are their not benefits to promoting esprit de corps? We do that in many ways: By having dress uniforms, dept patches, company logos and/ slogans, awards for heroic actions, Giant flags hung from ladders along with a flag drapped coffin and Honor guards for our departed brothers. Parades and open house events. The fire bell on the rig or the gold leaf & murals. While many take this to extremes, what benefit to the tax payer are these things? Their is value in these items, in building up an organization. If not why dont we paint every ambulance white with an orange strip (as in the original KKK standard). why not 1 color for fire trucks? wouldn't that save taxpayer money? Esprit de corps Morale, also known as esprit de corps when discussing the morale of a group, is an intangible term used to describe the capacity of people to maintain belief in an institution or a goal, or even in oneself and others. The second term applies particularly to military personnel and to members of sports teams, but is also applicable in business and in any other organizational context, particularly in times of stress or controversy. While the term is often used by authority figures as a generic value judgment of the willpower, obedience and self-discipline of a group tasked with performing duties assigned by a superior, more accurately it refers to the level of individual faith in the collective benefit gained by such individual sacrifices. According to Alexander H. Leighton, "morale is the capacity of a group of people to pull together persistently and consistently in pursuit of a common purpose". Note: I am not knocking DFVAC for this missed oppurtunity. They debated what was best for them. My point is how fast everyone is willing to write off the value of this concept.

You are correct, what a waste of government money to maintain any antiques (like this 125 year old antique). Wait. History is important. I really wish My dept had not gotten rid of some of those wonderful pieces of history that all we have left is some pictures. Since everyone has jumped on DFVAC as being a governmental agency, has anyone considered that they maybe a private not for profit corporation and not an arm of government.

So if my busy dept (and most other busy depts.) believe you need at least 5 years as a firefighter before earning the right to test for the right to be a 1st Line supervisor, how can “slower” depts. consider 2 years is enough experience to be one? It is not about war stories, it is about competence to lead and make sure our firefighters go home at the end of the shift/call. Yes I assume it, since it is required by NYS Law. Yes we know that it is hard for some depts. to maintain and that’s why the MTO’s are now running live burns for those depts.. I include these depts. in my statement. they need to recruit, hire or consolidate, as they do not have the staff needed to respond properly. I don’t consider the EMT Bravo forums as the determining factor for manning. I look at the national standards as developed by NFPA, ICMA, ISO, IAFF and I even look at the manning standards in Belgium, England, France, Germany, Ireland, The Netherlands, Scotland, and Wales (along with others). Some of have been in place for over 60 years. Based on every standard along with the ratings given to depts. in Westchester and in most communities, the number of depts. that are dispatched to handle a simple room and content fire. We hear this on a regular basis. “We do the best we can”……..So you have looked at consolidating, hiring, and all other methods to grow? If you are not meeting minimum standards and you have not done “EVERYTHING” then your line is just that: “a line”. I do not need to know what dept. as it easy to make it based on your statements of your minimum requirements and how sometimes you can’t even find people who meet them. Maybe I did misread it, since I agree that it is good that you would not consider not fill a vacancy with an unqualified FF just to fill the slot. But my point was twofold; 1st If your standards are so low that the difference between qualified and unqualified is the slim margin you listed, it does not really matter. 2nd If the depth of personnel is so shallow that you do not have a waiting list of qualified personnel then you have a problem.

Bravo We found another way for those on the rescue (no pump)... Those who understand shooting skeet will get this...in reverse. When shooting skeet, you yell "PULL", then a clay pigion is thrown into the air and you try to "SHOOT" it. Hence...PULL...BANG. For the Rescue Company you take out your Bridger Line Gun. and you "SHOOT" it then have someone "PULL" the rope, and the rope, brass rod and the cat should come right down.

I find it hard to believe that any dept. would consider 2 years as enough time/experience as a firefighter to be able to supervise and instruct other firefighters. In many cases they have just completed probation. How many actual fires and emergencies could an individule go on to "learn the trade" in 2 years? I am not trying to make this a career/vol. issue, but how can the career side accept volunteers as "the same" when we require our new firefighters to have 2x the training level as your Lt., just to graduate the fire acadamy and respond to calls as a probie under the direct supervision of an officer If you do not have enough personnel that can meet the standard that you have set (which I have already commented on as being very substandard as well as dangerious to the public, the members and themselves) then its time to reconsider how you deliever fire protection. If there are not enough trained personnel, you need to recruit more, hire more, train more or consolidate with another dept. so that you can meet the most basic of standards for providing protection to the community.

I don't know why they reacted that way, but it was not from previous experience in my system, since it was the 1st shift for both members of the crew, in the 1st 3 hours of a new contract. I would have had no problem if they said they were required to get their own, or waited a few more minites. Since I had given them 2 set, 3-5 min apart. by the time they had set up the IV it would have had been time for a 3rd. Telling a patient that you do not trust some of the responders that are standing in his living room is a good way for the patient to loss all respect for you. Particularly if you do not know who the patient or the other responders are. I knew the patient for 20 years and he had given me medical control orders for many of his patients.

I agree with what you are saying and have seen this issue more times than I care to, but I have also seen the reverse. One call that stands out in my mind was a 2am Diff Breather. The Pt. was in his 70's or 80's awakened at 3am with diff. breathing. My BLS-FR Engine arrived, determined a chief complaint, placed the patient on oxygen, baseline vital signs done. Meds & Hx written down for the Medic and we were taking a 2nd BP when the ALS crew arrived on-scene (we were there about 4 minutes prior). I did not know the crew and they did not know me (they also did not see my certification patch). I advised them that the age/male pt. with a hx of CHF, on lasix with 3 pillow orthopnia was awakened due to DIB. Also advised that we were there before (for similar problem) and the full pt vitals and that he had rales 1/2 way up bilaterally. The EMT said thank you removed our bp cuff and placed theirs on and started to take another BP. The patient asked why a 3rd was needed and the crew said: "We have to take our own because we cant trust the firemen to take a BP". The patient turned to the medic and asked if this was true. Before the medic could answer the patient started yelling at the EMT. He said as a cardiologist, he would trust my assessment and before discounting the 1st responders, they should pay a little more attention to whether we appear to have a clue. He then advised the crew that the engine company had 3 EMT's and a paramedic instructor. You never know the level of training you will find on an incident. The range covers the spectrum. This has not changed in 30 years. While its an issue, its nothing new as its always been an issue. I believe that this along with a lack of ongoing supervision are the biggest areas that we have to blame for poor skills at all levels.

If you hear that, they ran out of fuel 3 days ago, since the Urea tank holds enough for 3 full tanks of diesel fuel.

Anyone know what this unit carries and its roll? Thanks

NYPD "Tiger Technician"

While its a nice thought to invite others. If you don't have the manpower to handle this incident, mutual aid is not the answer. You need more personnel....hire, recruit or merge with others.

Dispatch the special operations trailer, pictured here:

In our case, its only 150 years. The problem now is we have the highest demaned in our history and the fewest resources. While we will continue taking responsibility for other peoples stupidity we have reached the ceiling.

Narcan is not a tool to fight the use of heroin. It only fights the effects I'm not judging them. I'm rationing my resources to do the greatest good for the greatest number of people. If you save enough of them, they know that its ok to keep taking this s***. "Give a man a fish and feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. I watched medics do this, including walking them down 5 flights while carrying their own IV. I have also seen medics get the s*** kicked out of them after thinking that this was a good idea.

Our BLS 1st Responders are trained and equipped with Epi pens to help patients in anaphylaxis and albuterol to treat asthma. Anyone suffering from anaphylaxis or asthma generally has little or no control over these medical conditions. While this may sound a little cold, but at what point do we stop taking responsability for the stupidity of others? You play russian roulet with heroin and you may take a bullet. Why is it our responsibility to protect you from yourself? I have no problem with ALS units providing this service, but we have limited resources and its getting to the point that if we add something new, we need to take something away.

How about before we give BLS units meds, we require they need to respond to calls after the 1st tone out and within national standards for dispatch and turnout times. Note I will let the response time slide, because as stated, some of the distances are far (and the response time standard is based on urban/suburban).

NYS eliminated the EMT-D certification over 12 years ago. The "D" is included in the basic EMT-B certification, which replaced both EMT & EMT-D

At $2.2m there is not a lot to cut. Which areas should be cut: Street maintenance, snow removal, street lighting, traffic lighting, sanitary and storm water system maintenance, Fleet maintenance for all village vehicles, mintain parks, maintain 1/2 of water system (other 1/2 is united water) plus meter reading. The have 9 employee's

Very interesting. Meanwhile, we watched it develope (by the same company that developed the post radios) and have been waiting till the final bugs are worked out of it. It is very similar in concept to Motorola's Fireground Managment Software (which many depts including us use). It apears they have upgraded it to merge other pre determined data.

According to the last ISO report they average less then 2 volunteers per call. That was a number of years ago and I think that number maybe considered very high now (as in I think the average has dropped).

I agree. John ment to include them not push them out of the way.

ISO does not use career and volunteer, it uses On-duty and On-call. On-duty means in the fire house ready to respond (paid or not) and On-call means they will respond when paged (volunteer or paid recall). On-duty is 12 + 1 IC On-call is 36 + 1 IC or 3 on-call for every 1 in the station. These numbers are on EVERY CALL. If you had 12 career ff's and they worked 24/7/365 and never left work that would count, now of course that does not happen, so you need enough to staff at 12+1 based on the number of hourse you have them work. The 36 on-call is for every response, so again how many do you need on the roster to get 36 on a call? ISO knows that on-call fires do more damage because of the delay and the fire will be larger when you arrive.

The people being wealthy and paying high taxes does not mean they can afford the services needed. I have a friend who lives there and they pay $40,000 in property tax, but only about $8,000 goes to the village (the rest is school & county). Now there are only a few 1,000 homes. That does not leave a lot of money to pay for police, fire, dpw etc.

I advised everyone of that. Was still told to make it low. I missed it. LOL