Is this crap or not

I just heard that the GEORGIA STATE SENAT was going to stop fire departments from charging the insurance companies when they go to say for example car fires, and house fires. Now on my volunteer department, we have a funding problem, our county and city has a little bit of a SO CALLED CASH FLOW PROBLEM lol. Any who, I wanna know all u Brother firefighters opinion on his issue, ol joe blow says his/her premiums are goin to go up if they charge there insurance company. Now you tell me whats more important a damn insurance premium going up or a firefighter that makes little or no pay coming to help ol joe blow, TELL ME SOMTHIN.

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Permalink Reply by mike wright on February 16, 2008 at 9:24pm
Here we have the same problem cash flow. This is how we make up some of our cash flow problems. We get very little money to run on now, and if we didnt get the insurance money we would really be hurting. Here we have no problem getting the money from the insurance companies. Most people who call us especially for a house fire like the idea we show up in time to save the house. They dont have a problem with higher premiums for as much as we do for the community here. And to answer your question that is crap.
Permalink Reply by Engineco913 on February 16, 2008 at 9:34pm
Imagine the premium prices if you have to close your doors when you don't have funding to stay open? Wouldn't it nice to have your fire department be 10 minutes away when before it was 2 minutes. Oh thats right, that firehouse closed from no funds. Stupidity. Have your state Fire Chiefs association fight it like crazy.
Permalink Reply by Marc Hansen on February 16, 2008 at 9:56pm
Cant quite understand the reasoning behind that one. If you total your $20K car incur $1k EMS ride(minimum) and god knows how much for ER visit its only the $500 the local FD gets that will raise his premiums? If I was you guys I would urge everyone I know to SUPPORT this...because it would be against the law for anyone to close your doors because if you closed your doors the area's ISO rating would go to 9 or 10 therefore the fire department cant close because John Q. Publics homeowner premiums would go up and it would be illegal for the FD to do anything to raise premimums.
Maybe I should run for office, it would be nice to have a job where cause and effect(or plain old common sense) doesnt influence what I do.
Kinda proves that old saying "if common sense was anymore common they'd have to find a new name for it" --dont it
Permalink Reply by Art "ChiefReason" Goodrich on February 16, 2008 at 10:15pm
We only charge for our services if they are an out of district user. We do not charge for any fires in districts that we have mutual aid with.
Typically, it is a car fire or MVA and then we don't charge insurance companies. We charge the vehicle owner.
It is up to them whether or not they turn it into their insurance company.
I would recommend getting with your fire service lobbyists there and getting in touch with your state representatives and voice your concerns.
Taxpayers should not bear the cost for services rendered to non-taxpayers. There should be a fee and that's that.
Nothing is free anymore.
TCSS.
Art
Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on February 16, 2008 at 10:39pm
If I understand the theme of this discussion, your departments get a fee from the insurance companies? For instance, if a fire occurs in a house in your district, your department gets some type of compensation from the insurer of that house?
Permalink Reply by Engineco913 on February 16, 2008 at 10:43pm
Our FD has a policy that is adopted from the Rhode Island Association of Fire Chiefs. In a MVA when there is fluids spilled, it is deemed a haz mat incident. There is a fee for materials used, fee per apparatus per hour (foam capabilities are worth more), fee per man per hour (increases as the rank goes up) and is submitted to the persons insurance company. I am not sure about the billing for a structure fire, but I dont believe we do. There is a fire tax levied by the fire district so billing for home fires would be a little much.
Permalink Reply by Marc Hansen on February 16, 2008 at 10:44pm
Actually we bill insurance companies for most services that we perform based on the fact that there is money set aside in the policy for fire response. If we recieve checks from the insurance company it is greatly appreciated, however if we recieve nothing from the insurance company then we do not send a bill to the individual. The 1 mill tax that we recieve is used to make sure the equipment is there and ready to answer any call for help, the fee for use is so that the people that actually use the equipment help in paying the maintenacne fees that come with that equipment
Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on February 16, 2008 at 10:51pm
Gee, I have never heard of that. It could be a New York State law that prohibits billing the insurance companies.
Permalink Reply by Bobby King on February 17, 2008 at 4:18am
We have the same cash flow problem in Madison County.. We run outdated apparatus and protect Million Dollar homes .. I honestly dont know if the citizens here know What We are having to protect them with..

In My county they do not charge for Fire or Crash Rescue Runs .. They do charge for EMS runs only if they transport though.. I think that it would not solve the cash flow problem but it would definately make a dent in it ..
Hurst Tools run on Aircraft Grade Hydraulic Fluid which is I think 80 bucks a Quart .. And We use it pretty Frequently in Our Spreaders.. Not to mention Gas is 3.09 for Regular unleaded .. and if you throw in Our own Insurance for the FDs and Rescue Squads that comes to quite the pretty penny.. The Federal Government Could give a Damn about Us.. and so could the Citizens We protect .. Or at least it feels like that sometimes..

I wonder what these people would do if All of a Sudden We couldnt afford to Operate anymore...
I guess it only makes sense to have a Million Dollar home but not fork out to help protect Yourself and Your neighbors..

Firefighter Rescue Tech
Bobby King
Madison County Fire ( Kirksville District) Madison County Rescue ( County Wide)
Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on February 17, 2008 at 2:44pm
We negotiate a new contract each year with the towns we protect. Well, negotiate is not quite the word; we look at the prior year's spending, add in any expenditure amounts we are projecting, and present the total figure to the town boards. There is a public hearing for any one to come and discuss the new amount; generally there is no problem with modest increases.

So Eric, I don't know how your department gets funded (aside from the insurance fees) so you may want to find out and see if the projected lack of fee income can be covered by an increase in the base contract amount. The proposed action by the senate should be more than enough justification.
Permalink Reply by jmillsaps2204 on February 17, 2008 at 4:28pm
If they did something like that at my dept. it would hurt the dept. but now what is more important to a politician the voly dept. that protect the state/county/people or a money hungry lobby in his ear telling him there company shouldn't have to pay it if they are planning on donating to his campaign fund next time around.(LOL)
Permalink Reply by Nate Mills on February 17, 2008 at 4:52pm
We charge for out in the county runs, but in city is free of charge. Doesn't matter anyway, the money goes into the city general fund and we never see a penny of it any how.

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