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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 Korrey on
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Volunteer are not generally recognized as having a duty to act. If you aren’t receiving pay or benefits for your service (remuneration) then your acts remain a voluntary choice and not a legal obligation.
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Permalink Reply by lutan1 on
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Whilst from a literal or legal perspective, you may be right (don't know, not my area of expertise), I reckon based on the emotion in this discussion and others on the same topic, I reckon there'd be plenty of vols who would disagree with you....
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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Korrey,
An individual volunteer can choose to respond when the pager goes off, there really is nothing obligating them to go. The dept itself is a different story, since there is an obligation to the citizens (granted majority of any dept, be it career or volly is supported by a tax based system) so there should be a response. If the dept can't muster enough volunteers to respond, then there should be MA type of agreements in place to cover.
Another aspect is a volunteer who is acting in a "work" capacity at the station or signed up for availability does have a duty to act. This is where some depts have people who sign up for "shifts" etc that if a call comes in they go.
The reason there is no duty to act in this case is because the area in question is covered by subscriptions and thus each homeowner is responsible for their own fire protection costs. Since there are no tax dollars supporting all residents, nor a dept established in the area, the nearest responding dept is basically relagated to a contracted service per homeowner. Since the owner in question here did not pay a subscription, there is no duty to act.
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Permalink Reply by Mike Schlags (Captain Busy) Retd on
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Have you looked at it this way?
Your department has taken the stand that unless someone pays twenty-cents a day, they will not receive fire protection in the event of a house fire. I'm reading into this maybe, but if an individual makes the call that it is his duty to respond, wouldn't they be guilty of not following departments rules and regulations and more importantly a direct order from an officer? WE have rules for a reason. Having folks go rogue, or as we call it on the West coast, "Free Lancing", is a dangerous thing and certainly doesn't not go along with the departments SOP or SOG's.
You do bring up an interesting question Jason. If we are not talking about a "fire", would folks apply this philosophy to other types of rescues, including MVA's involving extrication? Personally, if someone needs help, I would find it difficult not to respond if it was a rescue situation. So, do rescue's apply to this philosophy? Children and folks visiting the area should not suffer the consequences of the property owner making the call to not pay for services.
This is one of the reasons why you don't typically see volunteer / paid / call firefighters in Southern California. Very convoluted and turfy... And all because folks are too cheap to pay twenty-cents a day?
What a nightmare you guys have to deal with...
-CBz
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Permalink Reply by Engineer k7 on
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When we joined we sorta speak heald up our righthand and swore to " Protect Property and Life " but due to the taxpayers voting on having a subscripton for fire service back in 1990 and apparently haven't tried to have it changed over the years. So in lew of what has happened over the years in that county it has made town and city fathers and Fire Chiefs look very bad to the outside general public. We cannot blame them for this action. They need to include the fire fee in there property taxes
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Permalink Reply by Ben Waller on
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There is another potential complication with the SFFD trying to collect a post-extinguishment bill for non-subcribers in rural Obion County.
Since their governmental jurisdiction ends at the city limits, if they extinguish a non-subscriber fire in the county, both the non-subscriber and the non-subscriber's insurance company could legally refuse to pay the bill, since technically the city FD has no jurisdiction without having a contract with the individual property owner.
As for Worker's Comp, it is not an issue unless the SFFD or its members carry volunteer employment insurance with a 3rd-party agency like VFIS. SFFD is a volunteer agency, so their Worker's Comp situation is dramatically different than those in a career FD.
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Australia...
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Have not heard about the electric surcharge. If this site had a like box to check, you would get one from me on your comments. I also thought your off the wall comments that Jack noted were, to me, colorful and amusing.
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Mike,
The utility surcharge is a good idea IF the l locals want to pay for a fire department.
The problem is that you are discussing a funding mechanism for a tax that the rural Obion County taxpayers have repeatedly voted down.
There is no point in developing a collection method for a non-existant tax.
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That's great, but in your area, the neighboring town wants tax funded fire protection.
That might work in Obion County if the taxpayers changed their minds, but as long as they keep voting for "No fire protection", that's what they will get.
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Permalink Reply by FETC on
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I understand that Ben, I am trying to say just stop offering subscription services to your neighbor all together. Therefore the county administrators will then be forced to implement a fire tax to protect everyone in Obion County. Could be a new VFD or then pay for every residence in the county to the neighboring department. The administrators are never going to push this issue, especially if departments continue to offer the subscription services. You see it keeps county taxes down. Also doesn't make one resident fund the others protection. BUT until the administrators home no longer has fire protection, this issue will continue to be swept under the rug.
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I don't think that will ever happen, because the city fire departments in Obion County actually have their hearts in the right place. They don't want to just tell the county residents "You don't have ANY fire protection, even on a temporary basis."
The other issue is that the subscription plan does two positive things for the city FDs - it increases their budget, and it increases their call volume, and thus the amount of experience their firefighters get relative to what they would have without running the county fires.
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