County Wide Fire system

[CM36 4]

i think that their should be a county wide fire system with one central dispatching system and each department should be # like the way that they do i rockland, Prince George County MD, or like the way they do it in Delaware County PA. this makes it a lot easier when giving out # for rigs and could also be linked to the county ems system suggested by 801 and RWC130

[Guest SpecOps]

I think it is a good idea. It certainly would make inter-agency mutual aid and communications much easier and efficient. I doubt this would happen anytime soon, because alot of people are understandably hesitant to give up local control.

I wonder what the downside to a county-wide dispatch system would be?

[RWC130 594]

I happen to have visited with a few fire dispatch agencies and I can only say good things about having a county-wide dispatch. The very 1st thing that should happen is establish county-wide "Dispatch Only" frequency. Suggestion would be one for Northern end and one for the Southern end of the county. Too many agencies on 46.26 and now that almost everyone is getting repeaters it's only a matter of time before it gets out of control if not at that point already.

We have other low band frequencies and the UHF Fire Grounds but let's face it. Do we utilized them? No. Do all department's have the correct radio equipment? No. Has anyone ever listened to when you have more than one working fire or major incident? It's too much radio traffic. I have to give DES "60 Control" a lot of credit. I've heard a working fire and then some department comes on announcing the ladies auxiliary spaghetti dinner. Read it now and it's a good laugh but for the chief officer on the scene requesting an additional ladder for people trapped I don't think it was funny.

C'mon!! By having a "Dispatch Only" frequency you would dispatch the call and the agency would respond on another frequency. Once on the scene you should switch to a Fire Ground. This may sound like a lot of frequencies or radio equipment it's not. Look at all the various systems out there now. Multiple Low band frequencies, UHF repeaters, UHF Fire Grounds, VHF repeaters, Vehicle repeaters. We are repeater crazy!

Why? Because the current system is not working.

I think the county should switch everything over to UHF but personally I must say I am not sold on the county-wide trunking idea at all. Well, that's my suggestion and opinion I hope to have some feedback.

On last thing on safety. PLEASE UTILIZE THE UHF FIRE GROUND FREQUENCIES!! Firefighters have died being trapped in fire's making mayday calls on a repeater system. The Command Post or a Firefighter 20 feet away may not hear you. Simplex direct unit to unit is the ONLY way to go for on scene communication. I say this only because I know of a few department's who still operate this way and it's so dangerous.

The life you save could be your own.

[Guest chrism498]

I agree that it might cut down on confussion to have department numbering systems so if you were department 8, your rescue is now rescue 8, engines 8, 81 or department 50 is rescue 50 and engine 50, 501, 502 etc. But, how do you address the cities.... does each station get a number, or does the department just have one number? Additionally, think of all of the relettering that would be required county wide on the apparatus! I also think the idea of have a dispatch only frequency would be beneficial.... I mean just look at all of the transmissions that are stepped on on a day to day basis!

[Guest DG795]

I think we all can agree that the current system is not adapting or meeting our needs...The technology is very old and there is no uniformity across departments. In Yorktown, as in several other departments, we have bought into the county's 8 F/G Freqs, and also use a UHF repeater to 46.26. The result is two-fold: 1) Fireground units may communicate with each other without using dispatch freqs, 2) With the Repeater, all are F/G radios are the same, allowing communications with 60 control if necessary, and taking the guesswork out of what radio to use...b/c they are all the same. Like Cm36 said, I think the radio system of Prince George's County, MD illustrates how a busy Fire and EMS system can be kept in control through good training and an updated system.

[CG206 29]

I feel that a centralized dispatch center for both Fire and EMS would work much better than the current dispatch/radio sytem in the county. A lot of the guess work between the different dispatch agencies would be eliminated. Phone calls and notifications between seperate dispatch centers would end with a new system, which in turn, would decrease the time delay in dispatching an alarm. Also, all communications would be dispatched from 1 center, eliminating different agencies stepping on each other on the already conjested frequencies. A new frequency system should also be set up with more channels or more organization of the current channels including the UHF fire ground channels should be revised to eliminate agencies from stepping on eachother, as seen during storms or multiple incidents operating at the same time. With the current confusion between the different agencies plus the over-use of the frequencies now, I feel a centralized dispatch center would work better for Westchester.

[RadnorCo15 0]

To elaborate on what CM36 is talking about in Delaware Co., PA...All stations are assigned a number, I'm with station 15. The apparatus designations throughout the county are 1-5: Engines (Engine 15-1), 7: Ambulance (Ambulance 15-7), 9: Chiefs (15-9), 10,12,13: Line officers. Apparatus such as Ladders & Rescues are Ladder 15, Rescue 15. The countywide policy of "plain-speak" or using no "10-codes" helps avoid confusion, as the uniform numbering system clearly defines what type of unit and from what local is calling. If there are more than 1 type of vehicle, they are designated with letters, so a**'t Chief is 15-9A. In Westchester apparatus are numbered by no particular order with the exception of chiefs and that gets kind of confusing. All departments have either a private dispatch frequency or common dispatch channel comparable to 46.26 in Westchester. However, all communications to the county occur on a separate UHF repeater system with 0ver 15 channels. Fire control has the ability to assign separate incidents their own ops freq. These channels also do simplex for fireground ops. A nice feature Station 15 has is a cross-band repeater that rebroadcasts all our response traffic back over our dispatch freq. so volunteers can still here whats going on while responding. This would be a great alternative for westchester depts who woulndt have to change their pagers if and when the county gets a new system up and running.

[Guest alsfirefighter]

You don't have to look far to find one of the best county dispatch operations. Dutchess County ahs been operating in that capacity for a number of years. Their system is very organized and they utilize an apparatus specific numbering system where the 3rd letter is what the apparatus is. Just as in Putnam's numbering system. They utilize a dispatch only channel (this just changed in the past year or so, you use to call out responding and on location) a command channel, and now a call out channel, which is their old "all comm 15" which was an additional channel that was a county wide repeater. The operation as they do it now use to be their "storm mode" however they found it eased in dispatching units as the call volume continually grows with their population.

Now the only real way the county system would work here is if all the PSAP's gave the primary answering point distinguishment to the county center. No more, go check out a poss. fire, or I have a call for an alarm sounding or smoke in the area, let me know if you need FD. Or for those whom do EMS also, no more unknown medicals because the PD didn't transfer the caller to control.

[61MACKBR1 222]

I happen to agree (and I am in the "minority" within my district), because the County has already established a listing of Westchester County designated Fire Apparatus Numbers "all accross the County" The advantage would be one "unified" dispatch, able to control the entire county, which would be helpful for Mutual Aid. HOWEVER, "as everyone knows" there are "certain" mutual aid conflicts between certain "Cities" that has "Politics" crossing the lines of having a Centralized FD Dispatch for All of Westchester County a "Fantasy" and not a reality. For those who are NOT in the know, Yonkers FD has refused to provide mutual aid to Mount Vernon FD (caused by the City of Mount Vernon's inability to properly fund and support Mount Vernon FD's fire department, back during Mount Vernon's Financial Problems a few years ago). Why would Greenville come to Mount Vernon for Mutual Aid when you have a "neighboring" city, in Yonkers, who has one of the (If not the) best Fire Departments in the County, who is best equiped to provide a city, like Mount Vernon, with Mutual Aid. SO! with that, the MAJOR CITIES in Westchester County, will want and CONTINUE to maintain control of their OWN FD Dispatching (Yonkers, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon and White Plains)

[Guest alsfirefighter]

YonkersR3 excellent points!! I still think the County could operate more efficiently even if Yonkers, Mt. Vernon and White Plains wanted to still dispatch FD on their own. However, I think it would be beneficial if they utilized similiar CAD software as the county that each culd have access and input along the same lines and allow better resource management in the event of a disaster, terrorist incident or in the event of a system failure in any of the cities. I certainly advocate that on an EMS level also, it would be a great benefit to the citizens of Westchester to have the ability that when mutual aid EMS is needed, if a unit is staffed commerically or on a volunteer level, the next closest available unit could be utilized instead of toning out another unstaffed agency and add to the wait time.

________________________

IACOJ Bureau of EMS Chairman

FOOPS Contributing Editor

[Guest DG795]

The city dept's of westchester (Yonkers, Mt Vernon, New Ro, White Plains) are busy enough to maintain their own dispatch system, however they should have the capability to assimilate into the westchester county system (meaning having the same county radios and be in the CAD) in order to send a task force type mutual aid assistance. They also could be special called on a company basis to places like hartsdale, greenville, and fairview, where dept's like yonkers are close enough to be on a 2 or 3 alarm assignment. In my opinion, let the cities keep their dispatch, but have them prepared to assimilate into the countywide system.

[Guest DFFD227]

What ever happend to the good old days where volunteer depts went MA to Paid FD's?? Those were the days... [-(

[Fed124 0]

One word sums it up...........UNIONS

[Oswegowind 17]

If you are going to go with a county-wide dispatch system, why not just make it a county-wide fire system as well and then everyone would have to get along, right?

[Guest Lieutenant6474]

I'm a transplant from Adams Co., PA and PG Co., MD. Very easy the way it shoud be... It works best.... Every department has a number... Every department has box numbers that relate to their company numbers... Apparatus is based on the same system.

Example

Chappaqua would be Department 24 and their territory would be cut into maybe 5 box areas. Box 24-1, 24-2 etc. There would be 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc alarm assignments for each Box.

Chappaqua's apparatus would be labled E24-1, 24-2, 24-3, R24, TL24, MA24, U24.

Chappaqua's automatic mutual aid for each of their box areas would be on file with 60control and a dispatch would sound like this.

Tones....... In box 24-3 at 41 South Greeley Ave, A structure Fire. Company 24 is due. Also alerted to fill the box are (these would be listed with the county in advance) E13-1 R19 TL3 13B3 (these might be an engine and ambulance from Armonk, Millwoods rescue and P-ville's tower) When Chief 24 arrives and finds that his intitial dispatch isn't going to cover the call... The second alarm is transmitted and it's already on file with the county... All he has to say is "Chief24 to control give me my second alarm assignment for this box"

[Remember585 815]

Lieutenant6474 has the right idea, and it sounds very similar to the MABAS that Suburban Illinois areas use. MABAS, the Mutual-Aid Box Alarm System, simplfies most everything. If you have no control or no calmness on the air, it immediatly can turn into chaos. For starters, let's push for a FAST / RIT on all structure fires COUNTYWIDE. Those departments that don't call them and/or don't call them immediatly are putting their own men in jeopardy. Recently, a Westchester department was operating on a residential fire, and waited far too long to request a FAST. Luckily, the northern part of Westchester and river departments have been doing a good job at this for a few years. Our FAST responded to 17 alarms in 2003, all of which were immediate dispatches, unless it was the one incident where we were a 2nd due FAST. Big or Small, every Department needs to have a preplan for mutual aid, etc. before "game day."

[Guest alsfirefighter]

This may be off the topic, but since someone already decided to throw there .02 in I'm gonna throw my .03.

The question raised about mutual aide..the answer was given unions....lets not forget there are also volunteer organizations such as HV VFA and WCVFA.

Secondly, and this has been said by the commissioner of a large southern westchester paid FD, it comes down to training. You know what your getting he said.

And that is one arguement that cannot be discounted is that there is a disparaging gap between career and volunteer personnel in NY state. Before anyone flies off the handle, I think its completely wrong, however we are prisoners of smaller vocal upstate FD's whom constantly stunt efforts to improve training for all based on "its too long".

++++++++++++++++

The greatest principle of all is that what man thinks he can do, he can do.

[Guest DG795]

In my humble opinion, Westchester County will have a countywide system in the near OR far future...the question comes, will the volunteer dept's survive it. Putting aside manpower issues, look at your departments board of commisioners or executive board, and ask yourself; are these guys gunna give up some of their control to adhere to a county system, and "do it the county's way"? In my experience, the majority of governing bodies will fight tooth and nail against a county system, taking stock in phrases as: "we have always done it this way", "the county doesnt know our dept", or "I have been running the show for 700 years and we shouldnt change now". Little has changed operationally in this county over the past 30 years. Westchester is almost like the fire service that time forgot. most dept's are running different types of jobs, and doing more runs with less people. If the volunteer fire service is to survive, its time to become progressive and adaptive, and stop settling for "its always been done this way".

[Guest RBFD2]

DG795 said it best.

A county wide department will not happen...IMO. Reason.....EGOS. Commisioners, Chief's and Town Boards will not want to relinquish control and power.

I do think a county department is a good idea.

[dc2t 80]

Listen to the radio and you will here

of the fire dept that cannot appear.

mutual aid they say is the answer

but if you cant get out

what does it matter.

For all of the experts listen well and you will see

central dispatch is not the answer

food for thought

8)

[x635 4,066]

http://emtbravo.just5buckshosting.com/phpB...php?p=2293#2293

[Stench60 29]

A quick couple of notes on this topic. Also, please keep in mind that this is my first post on EMTBRAVO.

First to the post that complained of all the re-lettering that would have to be done on the equipment, this is why departments are told by the county that the Radio Identifier numbers are not to be lettered on any equipment whether apparatus, hose, hand tools or turnout gear. The numbers we use on the radio merely differentiate the various Engine Co. No.1 , Engine Co., No 2, Ladder Co., No. 1 etc... in each department from the rest of the Engine Co., No. 1's etc... in the county. These county numbers can be changed at any time ( see the departments that used to have quads, quints and patrols) to what the county chooses.

Secondly, the issue of the county actually operating a county wide fire service is not even woth the time and effort to discuss. It Is against NYS Law for a county to operate a fire department. There is absolutley zero chance of that being changed in anything approaching the forseeable future. We should concentrate our efforts on attainable goals, not What If scenarios best left to fiction writers.

If I got you to pause and think, whether you agree with me or not I've done what I set to do.

[Guest x901]

instead of everyone talking about what would be best, why don't you all start trying to push this all into play. Unify the County FD & EMS and let the "big boys" ( 'The Y-O', 'Da Vern', "New Ro', & WP) run their own show(s). If you need MA request it from them, if they are availalbe they'll respond. Yonkers is the busiest system for PD, FD, & EMS in the county, too busy for 60 Control to handle with their current capabilites. Yonkers is best served by Yonkers Communications Dispatchers as they know our area and the our needs.