On January 22 at the last G+ P, meeting Administration had
intended to present the Fire/Rescue Master Plan to council, at the beginning of
the meeting the CAO requested that the issue
be placed “In Camera” due to there being some sensitive Personal issues. They also stated that this plan is tentatively scheduled to be brought back to council and the general public on May 19 at the next G+P meeting.
Most of our present members of council ran on a platform of “Change”,
change that would make the municipality more “efficient”. My understanding of
efficient was doing the same for less, or in a perfect world doing even more
with less.
So let us get to the issue at hand the Fire/Rescue plan, this
great opportunity to provide us the good taxpayers of the Crowsnest
Pass
Therefore, what confuses the hell out of me is I and many
other folks are expecting this Grand Fire/Rescue Plan to bring us Less Fire
Stations, Less Equipment and Less Firemen. Some taxpayers would be open to
debate this issue if it was going to make us more “efficient” but the sad
reality is it is not.
In 2010, our operational cost of running the Fire
Departments was less than $300,000; today we are paying close to that just to
administrate the Department. Don’t believe me? Let us look at the numbers
Director of Community and Protective Services $110,000, Fire Chief $95,000, Assistant
Fire Chief $85,000. Assume that half the Director’s wages are being applied to
Fire/Rescue that is $235,000 just in salary, add on top of that the 35% that
the Municipality allows to cover benefits, the $235,000 becomes $316,000.
The next issue is the contract Firemen nobody knows how long
they are going to be here but at $6,000, a month each multiplied by the three
that are here that becomes $216,000 for the year.
Now keep in mind that we have not included a dollar for
Firemen’s wages for call out, being on call, or training. For a uniform, for a
tank of gas, a bad tire on a truck nothing has you can see for yourself the
numbers just do not make sense.
Would anybody like to disagree? Please show me that we will
have even the same number of Fire Departments, the same amount of equipment to
protect us and the same number of Firemen to serve us. After the full
implementation of the Fire/Rescue Master Plan.
Only in the Pass under this regime can we argue that being
more “efficient” is providing less at more cost.
10 comments:
I agree that this is way out of control.They are also doing everything they can to make it very difficult to go back where we were after the next election.I think they have given away all of the volunteer firemans clothing and some of their equiptment.Next I would guess they will try and get rid of the Hillcrest and Coleman fire halls.
Community spirit crushing move by a council that could care less about the people that elected them.On top of it all they play dumb and tell us that it is not their fault.
8 more months!!!
I believe there are 4 paid firemen @ $6000 each per month. That is $288,000 a year for just 4 guys, of which only 2 are available at a time.
With reference to the gear and such that was given away, one set of bunker gear cost us tax payers $8000, from what I hear. They gave away 10 pallets of gear.
This administration and council have apparently developed a "Scorched Earth" policy.
9:48
On the three versus four Firemen I used three because the last information I was provided was that one of the four was given the Deputy Fire Chief his salary is accounted for already.
Hillcrest and Coleman are gone.
Remember Crowsnest Pass East and Crowsnest Pass West?
What happened to the original Fire Plan prepared by the first fire consultant they hired? Did council meet to consider that plan? Was it voted down? Help someone, I can't find anything about it in the council minutes.
What is the matter with you people of the crowsnest Pass Grow a pair . What a bunch of wimps.
ANON 6:32 i guess we are all like "YOU" hiding behind ANON taking cheap shots. If it mattered so much to you and you really understood what is happening here you would be a lot more respectable of the people of the CNP. People are trying their hands are tied, times have changed you cant take matters into your own hands. Dont worry we will have our say unfortunately right now most are getting a valuable lesson in politics.
Is the new Fire Plan being revoked because election is coming? They can't get anything done because to have a public debate you need a "pair."
They are not revoking the New Fire Plan. They are just reworking the plan to make it more acceptable for October. But these are still the same guys who called the police on our own volunteers.
I agree they will make minimal cosmetic changes with the expectation that after the election they will have four years to make the real changes.
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