That couldn't be further from the truth, as I have a great respect for those who help others. I also understand that there is a great deal of danger involved in the job that you do, and I appreciate that you do it so that I do not have to.
I should remind our readers as well that all opinions expressed on this blog are not my own - some are that of readers of the blog. In those instances, there will be another name other than 'West Haven Taxpayer' associated with the comments, or will be quoted in my posts, which will look like this:
quoted words - these are not my ownor will have quotation marks around the words like "this". When I quote others, I try to be very careful to attribute the words to the person that has said them, and to indicate the source.
I've been very clear when I do not have the full picture, and I've asked for additional information. Remember, this blog started as my journey to better understand our tax situation, try to find solutions, and to learn about the local government system. I want your comments, suggestions, and to be set straight when I don't have all the facts. My intent is not to "spread lies", but instead to find out the reality of situations -- and to help others in this town understand the facts as well.
You'll see that I update articles when I have more facts. You may need to refresh your browser in order to see the updates. To do so, hold down the control key, and press F5. Alternatively, you can hold down the control key and click on the 'refresh' or 'reload' button (the name of the button varies by browser). The control key will (in most cases) force a reload of the page, instead of reading from your local cache.
The incredible lack of online information available to the tax payers of this town about the fire districts is very frustrating - the internet is a very inexpensive way of disseminating information. I will really applaud the West Shore fire department if they revamp their website, and put more information to help the taxpayers understand. I understand that is their intention, and I think it is a good one!
I invite ANYONE who has good sources of information to post them in a comment to me. I particularly invite those involved with the West Haven fire department to post your comments about the structure of the fire districts, and why you feel consolidation would hurt us. If it seems like a good new topic, you'll see your comment (attributed to you, or if you'd prefer, to an 'anonymous reader' - just let me know) as a new topic.
I ask everyone to NOT confuse this blog with the West Haven Taxpayer Initiative, with the Fire District Consolidation group, etc. I've seen a lot of speculation of who I am. Trust me, you probably don't know me - I'm literally one human being, and I have no political agenda or ambitions. Besides the fact that this is not about me, if you'd seen some of the comments that will never make it out to the blog, you'd understand why I have no interest in revealing my identity. I just want to better understand what we can do to make West Haven a better place to live, with reasonable taxes, and continuation of current good services, and better services that need improvement.
Feedburner
4 comments:
thetruth -
This is all conjecture.
1 (and 3 and 4). IF consolidation was to happen, that doesn't necessarily mean that firehouses would close.
2. Why would those who have a firehouse in West Shore repond to Allingtown or Center District??? It's MUCH farther away than the local firehouse. Our city isn't laid out in a manner that would allow fast response from a distance.
Very true that a fireman could be rotated to a different (current) district after a consolidation; I had misunderstood what you had meant.
In all the talks that I've heard about consolidation, the costs savings were in the administration of the districts, not in the individual closing of fire houses. In particular, the discussions I've heard bandied around included the cost of fire chief pensions. However, I imagine that there is much administration that is duplicated amongst the district.
Perhaps someone in the fire department could answer this - would there be a cost benefit to ordering supplies in bulk for the three districts as opposed to for each separate one? Can this be done now even with the districts being separate?
But this is all moot. There is no plan for consolidation right now, as best I can tell - nothing has been laid out on the table for the public to view.
First of all let me just say I absolutely respect each and every firefighter and the hard job they do. My beef is with the politics and the economics of it all.
Secondly, In yesterday's printed WH Voice I read an inquisitive letter in the Gripvine section trying to maked the point that about 90% of the calls the fire service makes are EMT related. Is this true?
In additon the author pointed out that West Haven should really consider the prospect of outsourcing EMT services to another place like EMS or something. They noted Milford and Orange pratice this. Is this true?
To end the letter the gripvine forwarded the questions to the fire chiefs at each of the districts but at last check had no response.
So what is the deal??? Is this a viable option that could be considered instead of, or along with consolidation?
"Car lock outs 122 5.71%
House Lockouts 26 1.22%"
Seriously, I mean SERIOUSLY???? The FD is assisting with car and home lockouts??? Such a waste.. Do these people call 911 from locking themselves out of thier car or home???
I seriously hope they are hit with the bill in the end, such a waster of time and resources....
Post a Comment