Firefighters Let Mans Home Burn Over Unpaid $75 Fee

Holy shit how can this be real?

 

I am a firefighter on a volunteer department,,,we dont get paid and we dont have shifts, we are covered by insurance as long as we are on an authorized and DISPATCHED call. We still have to conform to NFPA guidelines which basically triples the cost of any equipemt we have to purchase. We are funded by taxes here which means there is no question as to putting a fire out.. if its burns we put it out to the best of our ability.
That being said
weather a department is fee based or tax based the yearly cost are enormous and the fees you pay cover these cost. Think about this when you complain about how much taxes or fees are for your FD. boots $175 gloves $60 helmet $200+ nomex hood $25 bunker coat $800 bunker pants $600.. thats $1,860 per firefighter just to get them dressed and that doesnt include personal equipment such as PASS devices or hand tools.. then there is the equipment cost..
your right about 1 thing community should help each other... but it also goes both ways
It is a matter of policy that they didnt put the fire out.. These firefighters are on a paid department and thier jobs and livelyhood are dependant on following the chain of command. However i do think if they are going to offer this service to the rural areas they should have a policy and a form at the ready for the homeowner to assume all cost and responsibility for putting out a fire if they had not paid thier fee.

and to Pax.. a whole 2 hours? wow I have had hundreds and hundreds of hours of training, been inside numerous burning houses and buildings, here you cant even get issued bunker gear until you have had a min of 40 hours intense training even for a volunteer department, and that is before the "physical" stuff begins. Its very obvious you have no clue as to what you are talking about when it comes to a fire scene, all fire scenes are inherently dangerous and unpredictable.

 

Hurray for capitalism and Hurray for the New World Order.
With the sloga that if you ain't got the cash. You can kiss your own ass.

I just one question about this incident. Did he remember to change his Facebook status? From Happy home owner and animal lover to angry homeless guy.

 

Civilized rural areas have a fire district that covers the small towns, farms and rural residences in that area. They are staffed by volanteers both the fire department and rescue squad. All the volanteers are trained and have whatever licenses they may need. This is funded with property tax dollars. I used to be the assessor for this township so I really should be more informative but I dont have my material anymore to reference. The cost for fire is _ percentage of your taxes wich is from the assessed value of your property. The assessed value is 50% of your true and full value. Your are taxed from the assessed value a certain percentage depending on if your are residential, commercial, or agricultural. There are a couple of figures im forgetting here besides this. EVery chunk of property you own you get a statement for that chunk. There is a breakdown of tax dollars on the statement its not in percentages but in this area fire protection is gonna run you 10 to 14 dollars for each chunk of property. Why these folks arent in a fire district and just pay for the service through their property taxes I dont know, it costs less.

 

Lets say that you had a big fire...And you to get more help from another community, and that does happen. How do they handle that?

 

:beatdeadhorse5:


It was two days not two hours .

My argument was that the fire should have been put out not how it should have been put out. The cost of putting the fire out should have been worked out after the fire was put out. When do we stop putting a monetary value on a person's well-being and possible livelihood? Maybe I am living in a dream world, but that's just how I see things.

PAX


PAX

 

Libertarian's dream world. Yay for privatization and uncontrolled capitalism.

 

That is not true for all "volunteer" departments. I cross-trained with a couple departments that claimed to be volunteer, but they were paid a set amount (back then I think it was $50) just to show up and respond.

And that does not hold true for all accidents or all departments. A friend of mine from a PAID department in New York State was seriously injured at a fire, disabled for life because of it, and not only did the insurance company do nothing, but neither did the IAFF. He was a paid FF for over 18 years, and a well respected instructor in his department, until the accident.

That, I think, pretty much sums it up for every volunteer firefighter department I know of. I could be wrong though.

Mind sharing your source of inexpensive gear? LOL! Last time I saw a price list....
boots $250, gloves $120, helmet $225, nomex hood $35, bunker coat $1,100 bunker pants $1,400. Total $3,130.

Field gear (because we also did wildland call-outs)- boots $380, gloves $160, helmet $150, nomex breather $85, nomex shirt $90, nomex field trousers $120. Total $985.

Then the training. FF1 was in-house. The initial wildland "red card" course (back then) was a week long school, $3,500 for each firefighter. In that you got the S-130/190 and I-200 courses along with the Pack Test.

So the gear is $4,115 per firefighter, not counting the SCBA face mask, regulator or training. Sometimes deductions are made by re-using older gear. Not wise, but it's what every department I was with did it. My training also tacked on additional costs out of my own pocket. Like the EMT-B. That was $700 for the course (I had to pay for it) and all the needle poking I got (out of my blood and wallet) for testing and vaccinations. And I hate needles.

Standard Operating Procedures prevail. The rules can be "bent" or broken, but there is always the accountability issue there.

I used to keep track of all of my training, but I have lost my notes on that as I havn't served as a firefighter for a few years. To me it doesn't really matter what others say, maybe they have X number of hours of training, and X years of experience. Or maybe, in Pax's position, they are newbies. But that never says how much experience they have. I know before I got any certs I already had several years of hands-on experience.

BTW, I was Volunteer firefighter for 11 years (and part of that includes "paid temporary" firefighter for 6 months until the airport could get someone with certs as I had only experience, and paid wildland firefighter for 6 months), 2 of those years I was cross-trained as EMT-B, and then 2 years in search and rescue. I have worked county agencies, a number of small VFDs,

A total of 14 departments (in a couple instances several departments at the same time) and the length of time is confusing because of the multiple departments. I think it's around (Year 1 to year X) about 11+ years (I think).
It has little meaning to me. My references check out.

And to this date with the certs I have - EMT-B (before NREMT became mandatory), highway dept. flagger cert., I forget how many of the FEMA I series, S130-, S-190, (and I think one or two more. I forget) -I have yet to get my Firefighter 1. ROFL!

That's the way the cookie crumbles. Certs are nice. Not everyone gets them. Training is great, everyone gets that one way or another.

But it is never wise to laugh at someone's experience or inexperience, because no one really knows the details.

IMO

 

Logan
I assure you there are still 100% volunteer departments.
Im not sure about your state but here ANY FD volunteer or paid Must carry insurance for active calls.
Pricing is affected by many things (boots leather or rubber?) and quantity if you are buying multiple sets you will usually get deep discounts over single sets.
SOGs can be bent but not SOPs
Again Im not sure of your states requirements but here you would never enter a hot zone without proper certifications volunteer or not.

 

I know that Dirk. And I hope to someday go back. I have since discussed this with a fellow FF (he's a retired/paid FF) and he confirmed that. As I'm not admin and never have been, I had no idea.
The boots.... I never took one apart to know what it was made of.
But remember that new the rules for firefighters has changed. Back then I had experience, and that suited command. Now, who knows, but I want all the certs I can earn!

 

I agree.. I have more Certs than I can count but in the end its the real world experience that counts. You can have all the certs you want including FF1 and FF2 but until your actually inside and facing the heat you don't know how you will really react

 

In all my time I have been inside only a few actual structure fires. I really don't like those.

 

really? with 11 years in i would have thought you would have had at least a dozen or so. Yea they aren't the most fun places to be LOL although i have been in in several capacities. First attack, second attack, search & rescue, RIT .. its all part of it

 

I served in about half a dozen departments, and the biggest town I served in is around 2,200 population. Smallest was 39.

I still havn't gone over my resume for correct numbers on any of it. Doesn't matter to me right now.

 

This story definitely doesn't surprise me.

This is what society has become. Man doesn't care to help his fellow brother. It all boils down to the almighty dollar

 

How much do volunteer firefighters get paid? In cash? Or even check? How much?

Every VFD I served with the only pay I got was when someone survived. And then I went home with a warm & cozy feeling in my heart that *I* did something right for a change. THAT is what I was paid.

So please consider that the next time you say that about VFDs.

 

This guy coulda died.

This isn't about volunteer firefighters. This is about man helping man. These guys had the equipment to help him and they didn't.

I was engaged to a firefighter. I know how the volunteer shit works. Regardless, them not helping that man is ridiculous.

 

NO.
His life was not in harm's way nor was anyone elses.

I know for a fact that if his or anyone elses lives were in harms way the firefighters would have stepped in and done something.

Just because you were engaged to a VFF doesn't mean that you know the routine. In that case, the only loss was property. Hey, if you can afford property insurance you can afford $75 to the VFD. How hard is it to stick aside $6.25 a month? Pay the $75 and start sticking the $6.25 aside each month for the next year.

 

Seventy five bucks is quite a bit cheaper than the $300 I pay for a year of fire insurance.

 

Like I just said $75 a year for fire insurance is a deal and a half!!

My property taxes run OVER $1500 this year. I almost wish I had rugrats in school. I wouldn't be getting my moneys worth but at least I might not feel like I was getting raped!!