What if Volunteer Firefighters Didn't Volunteer?

Comment

Comment by THOMAS D HORNE on April 12, 2012 at 3:19pm

Oh you can't answer that question.  They would all be replaced by career staff.  That is what some of my IAFF colleagues believe.  If the volunteers would just stay home there would be endless expansion in the career ranks.  It's a nice theory but I just don't believe it.  If I did believe it I would stay home.  I'm not in this to lower the taxes for the county's well healed developers.  I'm only trying to improve the actual level of protection in my fully built out older community.  The developers have lots of money to but there way out of paying the actual costs of what they are doing with political contributions.  Meanwhile the county moved our ladder truck up to the newly developed are so as to avoid making the developers build stations, buy equipment, and provide a viable means to fund career staffing.   The only real remedy is slowly going forward.  All new structures must be auto sprinklered.  Now if anyone can figure out how to get the existing housing stock sprinklered we would have the problem whipped.  That would leave only seventy five percent of the present work load in the form of medical calls.  Half or more of those calls are needless.  The complainant simply does not need an ambulance.  Anybody that can solve the needless medical call problem would be a genius. 

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Tom Horne