Governing Magazine News Article about staffing

[JohnnyOV 2]

The Secret List had this in their latest email update, and I felt it was appropriate to share with everyone.

From the email:

A MUST READ (Because Your Mayor / City Manager Is Reading It)

"FIREFIGHTERS HAVE GONE FROM HEROES TO BUDGET BAIT"

Below is a LINK to an article from Governing Magazine that your Mayor, City Manager

and Elected Officials are reading right now-so it's probably a good idea if we read

what they are reading, to insure your local facts are presented and your elected

officials are well educated about YOUR FD.

AS THE ARTICLE STATES: "The new landscape has clearly been shaped by the brutal

fiscal conditions in localities. In an era of such severe economic uncertainty,

high-level municipal officials -- elected and otherwise -- have not been shy about

portraying firefighters as a group that has vacuumed up more than its fair share

of municipal resources -- whether it's for salaries, equipment and firehouses,

or for some of the most generous retirement packages offered by local governments

today...."

MORE HERE:

http://www.governing.com/topics/public-workforce/firefighters-feel-squeeze-shrinking-budgets.html

[http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=8hkx6tcab&et=1104205648678&s=87510&e=001McY1d8wmlZUnEZ23oebVk9z_qUdb772FkPNI-p_b-G5_0HDvxLMr3--N0SFUpxKoDBH9wgB7lzl3ZgvgZ7dEu9KXsfX7I8pjjOW49a2ajCpURgTJ930BeB0kcJsi9DnMQ5ESZkx7OjI53ULZBzXz58i3AVGZXPiuIFNY3SuZuagOfc62XKJP6o6dp6VvfVFygcclYgO6mS-NWDtCqI1kDOSdH_itBMXJ]

[firefighter36 52]

Some strong words in that article. No matter what, it seems as though we are the ones who they attack first during a fiscal crisis. Also, the NYS Conference of Mayors put out a pretty strongly worded report regarding controlling costs of public safety employees. Link posted below is from the NYS Professional Firefighters Website.

http://www.nyspffa.org/Docs/NYCOMReport.pdf

[helicopper 1,050]

The sad reality is nothing is off-limits anymore. Not PD, FD, teachers, public works, nothing.

We'll all argue that parks and other social programs are less important than us but there are an equal number of people saying the same things about us so it's a real no-win situation.

The bottom line is we all have to market ourselves more now than ever and be as proactive and positive as we can.

[efdcapt115 1,511]

As you say "the sad reality" is that some municipalities are going to go full steam ahead with their geometrical measurements of the service performance and stand-by units, blah blah.....

The "sad reality" is that some municipalities are going to go overboard; and one day their wake-up call will come in the form of civil unrest, rioting and lawlessness with inadequate forces to deal with their city being burned half down and their stores looted. Then they will be forced to confront the grim reality of our "society." Things can go down the crapper pretty quickly, and just because it hasn't happened in a while is no indication of when or where it will happen again.

It's human nature to forget, and very convenient for the mayors organizations to strike out against FD, PD, whomever is part of the line that keeps a city under control.....and one day the system collapses? Who knows...what city will be the first to find out....

One last item; Jonathan Walters the author of the article: GFY

Edited January 7, 2011 by efdcapt115