jr51070

I ask this every day. It is crazy.

Personally, I found this part validates much of Yonkers Fire union's claim.
Despite criticism by its own union president in recent years that the department is understaffed, Davis said the department has an "adequate complement" of firefighters but that relying too heavily on overtime during occasional shortages was cost prohibitive.
"The days are gone when we had unlimited budgets," the mayor said. "If we spend it all on overtime, we can't buy trucks, we can't upgrade (equipment)."
The Mount Vernon Mayor is essentially saying that they could handle more of their own business, but rather than using overtime and/or having their taxpayers shoulder the financial burden to do that, they are consciously putting that burden onto the taxpayers of other communities.

RIP, John! You left us too soon and will be missed. Condolences to all his friends and family at the PCSO, Westchester ME, Westchester PSEF, Peekskill EMS, Cortlandt Paramedics.

While this looks like a good way to determine what is spent, it is very deceiving. What is in each budget may not include many items.
As an example when doing a comprehensive budget comparison of 2 depts. a few years ago:
Dept. X had 30 career members and a budget of $16m
Dept. Y had 50 career members and a budget of $12.8m
Now both pay similar salaries, so in theory Dept. Y's budget should have been about $29-30m.
So how is this possible? Dept. Y's budget did not include the following:
Pension ( Paid from the HR Budget)
Health Insurance & other insurance and medical costs (Paid from the HR Budget)
Fuel, Fleet maintenance, Station maintenance, Utilities (Paid from Public Works Budget)
Hydrant Rental/Cost (Water Dept.)
Fleet Replacement (Capital Budget)
Computers & phones (IT Budget)
Contract Fees (legal Dept.)
Grants (Development Budget)
Without understanding the budget its a meaningless number.

IIRC, the first helicopter was a combination of grant money and county funds. I don't believe it was entirely funded by grants.
Unlike many projects where grant funded equipment sits idly by "waiting for the big one", the helicopters are used all the time.
Made sense to me at the time, makes sense now. IMHO.

There are 2. Both were obtained through grants, do not blame them, blame the US Government for the way they do things. The 3rd bird is around in pieces. They did not cost the County anything for the actual birds.

Understand, still better then what we got. Sometime it took years before you got to the class, some never went. The rational behind not letting us attend the FTC is we were not really County employees, the County airport was, not sure if it is, run under contract. Always seemed absurd, since the services we provided were int he County's best interest.

I was very surprised at those close up photos. I have seen it all so it was not that bad for me, except, I did not realize they were that close up. Since her family had a big hand in this show, I am pretty curious on why they would allow or want those photos in it. Seems "odd" to me. Bottom line, no matter why she did it, and I have no thoughts, and I am pretty confident my thoughts are pretty close to the truth, she was driving drunk and high and killed 8 people. 100% to blame, no matter what or how she go to that point.

"There is Something Wrong with Aunt Diane" ....Hmmm, Yep, she was high and drunk and drving the wrong way.

Except for when they leave them in the lot parked for 2 years, or more, in some cases I am aware of.

The waiting list to get one is long, 3 to 6 months is what I was told. All being delivered now have been acocunted for, so unless somebody backs out after the delivery to the dealer, you are going to have to wait. Early indications are it is a hit and will be a hot seller.