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And they watched it burn, again...
Before you comment read my whole post...
Well the story has broke again. I made this prediction in the many threads from the last fire in 2010 that got the FFN boards lit up. History repeats itself in the fire service. The homeowner this time admits they knew the past story of "Pay for Spray" in 2010 and about the $75.00 fee. They said quote, "never thought it would happen to them."
Here is the news video: http://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/local/Home-burns-while-firefighters-...
In my opinion, the FD who refuses to put out the fire is doing the right thing. As hard as that may seem, if the FD provides the service for free, then nobody in the county will pay. This story has been going on for many years. For those who don't know, the county has NO fire department, the residents know this. Many move there because it is cheaper to live there. Past studies have been done to reccommend providing fire protection services but it will cost the homewowner more in their county taxes. The county administrators have decided to keep it "Pay for Spray" meaning a neighboring fire department who does NOT have any jurisdictional requirement to respond to your county residence, is allowed to offer their services to each individual homeowner for $75.00 per year. If you pay the $75.00 subscription service, you will get a response and mitigation from the neighboring FD. This is not mutual aid, this is not automatic aid. This is paying for fire protection from a contractor. If you don't pay the fee, the FD has told everyone numerous times, no pay = no service.
In my opinion the lack of FD action keeps the integrity of the lousy system in place. The people who pay are getting services when needed and they are NOT subsidizing their neighbors lack of payment. The fire department unfortunately gets caught up in the media and the "passion police" when the story of "they just watched it burn" After the last story unfolded, many neighboring chiefs came out and tried to explain how small of a budget this fire department has, one chief even mentioned the fire chief sometimes, empty's the soda machine to buy fuel for his trucks with change.
So instead of continuously being the bad guy, I suggest the Mayor and the Fire Chief tell the county administrators that they are done offering subscriptions next year. Therefore no more subscription service to the county and the COUNTY will now have to fund their own protection services. The administrators will then have to assess a fire tax to their residents to fund either a volunteer fire department(s) or pay for services from another FD for every county residence.
Time to end the subsciption mess...... it is a black eye to the one's who have to enforce the rules and the integrity.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Bob Callahan on
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Honestly .... So a fire department "strips" a citizen of thioer money when they demand that they pay for fire protection?
It takes money to provide that protection, and if a citizen chooses they want to live in an areaa where they do not pay taxes to receive it, and choose not to pay to subscription fee to get it, there is no duty to act by the fire department. The homeowner clearly made a choice, knowing the concequences, not to pay fopr fire protection. There is no duty to act by the fire department in this situation. None.
The department was 100% correct for not acting. If they had, they actually would have been negligent to the rest of the community because the number od subscriptions would have dropped, which would have affected fire protection to the remainder of the community.
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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What would happen if there was a report of a person inside ?
We've been down this road before, life safety does trump the lack of payment, however, in the last couple cases, there was no life safety issue to contend with.
All I know is I couldn't stand and watch nor order my crew to do so.
And that is the position that these firefighters have been put in because the elected officials refuse to look to impose a tax so such scenarios wouldn't have to be dealt with this way. However, by no means should the taxpayers of the city worry about paying for the freeloading of those who choose not to pay a simple subscription.
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This is called duty to act people, pull your heads out of your rectums and see this. In the state where I reside this would be consideration for legal action by the homeowner, and the liability would fall on the officers of the department, present at the scene or not.
What duty? Why is there a duty to act if the fire occurs outside the jurisdiction of the department? I have no "duty to act" nor respond to a fire outside of my jurisdiction, we would, but then again all our neighbors have depts and we have MA agreements, but if they don't request MA, we have no duty to act to respond.
The fact is, there is no duty to act in such a case, none, zero, zip, zilch. There is no duty to act because the county has taken that off the hands of the public service and put it in the hands of the individual homeowner with a bogus subscription based service.
The department that I am a member of does not and cannot offer subscription services, they receive no tax base, no fire tax, no mill levy nothing, we have newer equipment and volunteers ready to act, because it is considered their duty to do so
And what states that the volunteers must respond? After all that is a "duty to act" right? Well, nothing states that a volunteer has to respond. However, the difference being is you are also talking about your own dept and your own area, this is what the people chose, well is it not a roll of the dice there then? After all, if a fire occurs in your jurisdiction, you have volunteers to show up (maybe, maybe not) to respond.....but what says they have to respond? Do you have mutual aid? If so, if nobody responds from your dept and MA isn't called, then is there a duty to act on their part? No, there isn't.
Besides, try not to cloud the fact that the jurisdiction where this fire occurred has NO FIRE DEPT of their own. The fire response comes from a seperate jurisdiction. There is no duty to act here, nor is there a legal ramification for the response that occurred. After all, if the homeowners cancelled their insurance policy and this then occurred, should there not be a duty to act on behalf of the insurance company?....................Try and tell me how those differ then. After all, the fire dept here is a contracted service due to subscriptions.....just like an insurance company....tell me how is there a duty to act. I'll wait patiently.
WE work for the money we make, we don't sit on our rear ends and wait for some govt official to give it to us after stripping it from a citizen who in these times may not have it to give anyway
And tell me where is the difference between a person who CHOOSES not to pay for any services and thus expects that other people who may not be able to give away their tax dollars to those who choose not to pay? Why should the city residents see a reduction in services or increased taxes to fund their FD so freeloaders who choose not to pay think they can just expect other people to pay for their problem.
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Permalink Reply by TJ Pagels on
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City residents who pay through their property or other taxes that go towards municipal services (fire, police, trash pickup, schools, etc) are entitled to a certain level and amount of services. Persons who choose to live outside of the city for whatever reason also may be taxed by a village or township for certain services and/or the school district if that is a part of the property tax base.
Here in WI state law requires each municipality; (city, village, township) no one resides outside of the three; to provide fire protection to it's citizens. The law does not dictate what type of fire department it must provide be it career, paid-on-call, or truly volunteer. The municipality may also contract with a private fire department and in WI we have several and the municipality can also use a private corperation like Rural/Metro does in AZ.
What is the law in TN? That determines duty to act. The WI law does not dictate the quality of fire services just that it be provided in some way shape or form. If the unfortunates in TN "gambled" with their fee I'm willing to bet they did not have a homeowners policy. While this is a sad commentary on our social/economic conditions for some in this country it just goes to show people do not worry about fire safety no matter what the cost.
The firefighters are placed in a bad position but it is not their fault it is their government that can't come up with a better means to create a tax base that ALL pay into and ALL benefit from.
It would be most interesting to determine what the cause of the fire was. PEOPLE DON"T CALL THE FIRE DEPARTMENT BECAUSE THEY DID SOMETHING SMART!!
I am the first to argue that the city taxpayers do not "subsidize" the outside city limits folks for any services. ALL pay their fair share.
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Permalink Reply by Tom Menees on
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As a retired Firefighter with over 27 years of full-time firefighting in Obion County, TN I feel I can respond to this situtation. These people (both fires) KNEW the Fire Department would NOT respond if they did not pay the Rural Fire Fee. The reporter from the TV station reported in a way that made the FF's appear to be the "Bad Guys" and not the home owners who knew they did not have fire protection. The FD responded for "Life Safety" if someone was trapped. CAN YOU BUY CAR INSURANCE AFTER you have a wreck that will cover your wreck ? Come on people get real, the FF's are NOT the bad guys - they are still the good guys - it's the irresponsible news reporting that got this whole mess - "MESSED UP". Put the blame where it belongs - on the TV crew that wanted to "make some news"
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Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on
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John,
I suspect you may have a hard time reading this, high up as you are on your white horse but consider this, the residents in the unincorporated part of the county had voted DOWN raising taxes for their OWN fire department. It would seem they all agreed that it was cheaper for them to take advantage of the neighboring city's funded-by-city-resident-property-taxes fire department. You see, those people out in the unincorporated county DON'T pay taxes to the city, only to their county board of supervisors. No county tax money goes to the city and no city tax money goes to the county.
By the generosity of the city, county residents can subscribe to fire protection for the ridiculously cheap price of $75 per year. I'm guessing that may even be cheaper than what the city residents pay for THEIR own fire department. Let me repeat; county residents do not pay taxes to the city so they are NOT entitled to the city fire department. Unless they subscribe. The homeowners in question chose NOT to subscribe and by their own admission, felt it (the fire) wouldn't happen to them.
Are you suggesting some form of socialized fire protection, whereby the tax paying residents in the city, that enjoy things such as police, fire, garbage, sewers and water should also have to provide those services to county residents who don't live in the city and don't pay taxes to the city? For free? Really, you're a socialist?
John, when you say you are disgusted that a dollar sign is more important than life or property, are you referring to the HOMEOWNERS WHO DECIDED AGAINST SUBSCRIBING TO FIRE PROTECTION FOR $75 PER YEAR? I hope you are, otherwise I have no alternative but to presume that your head is up your rectum.
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Permalink Reply by Don Catenacci on
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John,
YOU ARE WRONG in this case. It has been upheld previously. The county refuses to supply any fire protection to those outside the city. Instead they support this subscription plan where residents in that area pay $75 a year if they want fire protection. Those that don't pay get no protection other than rescue from the burning building.
Do some research before you go off half cocked. The reality in this situation is the city fire department has absolutely ZERO obligation to supply fire protection to this unincorporated area. NONE AT ALL. They are offering the service through this subscription fee in lieu of taxes for fire protection, which they DO COLLECT in the city. If I were a city resident and the fire department I PAID for through my taxes was offering services for free elsewhere I would be down at city hall pounding my fists on the counte complaining.
Dude, seriously, this is the system that the CITIZENS support in that area. It is the system the COUNTY put in place. YOUR ANGER is misdirected, these people KNEW about the subscription fee and made the conscious decision NOT to pay. If you want to be angry be angry at the people who refuse to pay and assume that the fire department will do the job for free.
Personally, as a Paid On Call firefighter, I absolutely HATE fundraising and believe that if we have to do it to buy essentials it shows a complete lack of support for the fire service in that community. In my mind any fundraising should be for special equipment or items for the station, the same with donations.
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Permalink Reply by lutan1 on
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I'm intrigued by the whole concept. I guess we just take for granted the services we get for free...
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Huh? What services do you get for free and where? There is no free lunch!
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If you pay taxes you are paying for the services. You don't get anything for free, including fire protection, police protection, snow plowing, road repair, parks, library, or any other government services.
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I'm intrigued by the whole concept. I guess we just take for granted the services we get for free...
So Luke, are you saying you pay no taxes then either?
That is the issue here, had there been a tax based system in place, then this conversation would be entirely different. Since this particular county chose not to provide a tax based fire service, the onus of service befalls the homeowner (with a subscription service). It was the homeowners that decded not to pay for the subscription, rolled the dice, and lost...................It really isn't much different than cancelling an auto insurance policy, get in a wreck, and think the insurance company will still pay.....nope.
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Yes we pay taxes, and I understand that the taxes pay for those services.
However, our taxes aren't broken down- we don't pay a specific tax to cover Police, Fire, etc.
The result is. you ring 000 in an emergency and they all turn up with their pretty lights and sirens regardless. There's no quesiton about it. There's no checking to see who has and hasn't paid.
Not related to this topic, but our mutual aid is automatic as well. If I'm the OIC and I ask for specific resources, they get activated, no questions asked, and they MUST (and do) respond.
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