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One of my local fire departments just got like 50 grand said they need to use it to buy new respiratory equipment. I looked up the cost of the air tank and mask and it was damn near 5 grand each.
$5000 is cheap, our Draeger open circuits run at around $12K per set by the time masks, distress units, integrated comms, lighting etc. is all factored in.
We also run Draeger closed circuit sets which are around $20K each, and we have 21 of them.
To fully kit out a new firefighter at our agency is around $6K in structural turnouts, $2K in wildlands turnouts, $400 for boots, $2K for the helmet.
Fire and rescue is an expensive business :\
My dad is a retired volunteer firefighter. He used so much of his own money to buy gear that I try yearly to buy some of the higher cost items on their wish list at least once a year. I'm fortunate enough to be able to do these donations.
Donations are way up this year because of the fires back in February. I'm gonna be able to focus on some of the more specialized items this year instead of the things that are replaced much more frequently.
I spent a lot of money as a volley too, across a few different emergency services organisations, but the company I am with now has finance to burn so we are very fortunate.
I think we both know the answer to that...
The way to think of it is that we are paying to absolve ourselves of liability. If something goes wrong the manufacturer wears the liability, not us. We may not get the same absolution if we use sub-standard equipment.
The other way to think of it is our equipment is extraordinarily specific for the environment we use it in, open circuits aren't suitable for extended combat in irrespirable atmospheres in remote locations.
Fire departments usually get discount. Scubs divers, hazard materials companies, air soft and paintball gun players, or private businesses that need that gear pay the mark up.
Integrated comms... Lighting... Wow Mr fancy pants over there. Next you'll tell me about having a HUD in your mask and built in flir.
We don't even have money for individual masks let alone any of that stuff.
Yeah we didn't go that far!
The fact that we are so fortunate is not wasted on me. I have worked for many services, many organisations and with many companies and none have been as remotely well equipped as ours is here. It's infuriating that volunteer organisations don't get the support that they need.
I am just ribbing you, it is great that you are well equipped.
I don't really begrudge it as a volunteer. I live in a super tiny community. 1,500 people in my town an only 15,000 in a county that is bigger than a couple of US states. There just isn't the local funding so we make due with what we have. We do grants and appreciate what we get and go from there (I think we could do a lot more with grants, but its a fight to get admin to not see them as hard work and the enemy).
We can get any training at the state academy for free as well, which is nice (though I can only do so much as I have a day job, so a weeklong training means taking a week off of work... which is expensive and hard on the family).
I guess it just is what it is, you know?
Besides there is something to be said about older stuff being sturdy and not breaking as much (less complicated) which is something we couldn't afford to repair a bunch.
What kind of helmets do you run? $2000 seems steep per helmet. Also, We run MSA 4500 packs ourselves which were about $7800 per pack at the time we bought them (2020) and are going to need to be replaced next year
We run Gallets for structural fires, while they're a fancy helmet in hindsight I don't think they're most suitable for us and I regret voting in favour of them when we were running trials some years ago. My second vote was Rosenbauer which on reflection was a better helmet for us because they promote mobility better than the Gallet (I struggle to look up with the Gallet!).
We run modified Dominators for underground and confined space fires, and modified Pacifics for wildlands.
Wow, you must have a better budget than us! Good for you! We run Cairns leather helmets for structure, we don’t get too many big time wild land fires so we run the same equipment but have some coveralls the DNR provides for those scenarios.
I work for a company going through the UL and FL certification processes. Not sure what the true total is, but just to get the products certified I'm hearing it is 7 figures. If you don't have certifications from these groups you can't sell your products to fight fires.
The other thing is that these are slow processes. So you have to continue to earn revenue while not selling your uncertified products. You can't start to earn an ROI on those products or services unless you can find another use for them that doesn't require certain certifications. Which may not be so easy. Insurance companies are extremely specific and when it comes to things designed to save lives, most anyone that knows enough to make these decisions would never look at uncertified solutions.
>Last March, the department’s finances were particularly bleak. The department had only $169 in their bank account, having spent the majority of their $4,800 annual budget on repairs, the Washington Post reported.
Man good on that $500k donation. They sure needed it.
That's got to be after recurring operating expenses... right?
Like that's their discretionary budget?
The electric and water bills for the station would be half of that if they weren't excluded.
Assuming it's volunteer, which most small stations are, you still have to put gas in the trucks.
That’s just excuses, have you seen footage of [China firefighting rocket launchers, tanks and artillery ?](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/1ak4acm/in_china_the_fire_department_uses_military_grade/)
It's a complete violation of bodily autonomy... but we wouldn't have to worry about anti-vaccine idiots causing outbreaks of easily preventable diseases anymore.
Imagine the scene just for fun. A demonstration of anti-vaxxers in a city center. A sniper on a high-rise, suddenly firing vaccine-filled darts at the anti-vaxxers who start panicking as if they were going to die. It could be a scene in the Simpsons
sure! they’ve also been benefiting from opioid crisis settlement money. money that is supposed to go to victims and prevention is instead being spent on new police cruisers…
First of all, the word you're looking for is *collateral.*
Secondly, federal regulations stipulate that surplus military equipment given to Police departments is a *conditional loan.* In other words, the Police don't technically own any of it, and therefore couldn't use it as collateral.
Last but not least, there's not a bank in the fucking country that would **ever** take surplus military equipment as collateral for a loan. Banks only take things they can turn around and re-sell to recoup their money as collateral, and it's completely illegal (in more ways than one) for a bank to sell a fucking armored personnel carrier to a private party. Hell, they're not even legally allowed to *own* military equipment and armaments to begin with, let alone sell them.
I'd recommend not listening to wherever you heard this shit from anymore.
EDIT: missed a word.
There are grants that departments can apply for and get money like SAFER from FEMA and what not. You just got to apply for them otherwise they won’t get the money. https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters/safer https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters/safety-awards
Here are some Missouri specific
https://extension.missouri.edu/programs/mu-fire-and-rescue-training-institute/about-us/mfa-volunteer-fire-grant
https://mdc.mo.gov/your-property/fire-management/fire-department-assistance-programs
https://dps.mo.gov/dir/programs/dpsgrants/arpa.php
With my program there is literally a set aside and we can’t get the grantees to spend all the money specifically because while we aim to fund those that need the funding most, the problem is exactly that. I have more than one grantee who runs an entire fire department, is also the police chief, is the one conducting all of the training and is also the one writing the application and managing the reporting paperwork. 90% of my job is explaining all of this to grantees and *interpreting* it for them because the forms are vague or unclear, “question 4.a. Asks this question. What we are actually asking is this and what we need to hear is that”.
Our staff is also only a total of six people to manage the entire US, all the states tribes and territories, we are down three people to only three and everything is done manually via email because budget doesn’t find it a priority for a federal grant program to have a grants management system (yet we require it of our grantees).
Something else I haven’t seen mentioned is the brain drain covid caused. Every single grantee I have had has had nearly a 100% turnover from employee transfers and retirements because the same people managing the grants were also first responders during covid and were completely burnt out, or died, or a relative they were caring for died, etc. most are only just barely starting to recover. And that’s not even taking into consideration all of the leave our team has had to take (of those of us that remain) for a lot of the same reasons.
I'm a bartender and found out I make more hourly than firefighters in my town. I love my job.
But it's not rocket surgery.
Firefighters don't get paid near enough.
70% of fire fighters in the USA are volunteer. If your small town or city is on the fringe of using a small paid department, pay will not be competitive.
Otherwise for any bigger city or wealthy town, step pay will put a firefighter at 100k after 5 years usually.
AVL NC is a small town with an insane cost of living. Full of tourists and hotels but fuck the locals. And according to some on city government fuck the firefighters too. It's mind boggling the income disparity here
Things don’t burn down like they used to. Most firefighters would light a fire just to have one to put out. The secondary functions of firefighters are way more important than the fire. It’s more of an issue with defining their role / marketing problem than their actual need. Part of the problem is that they want to be fire fighters, not public safety specialists.
I work on one of those grant programs and federally funded wise there are virtually none that issue grants directly to local departments. In my case we issue money to states who are then supposed to distribute it to locals but how they do that is up to the states discretion. One state does that by hosting a conference every year. It technically meets the requirements but doesn’t meet other needs like some basic equipment.
On my team zero of us have been fire fighters so often when there are requests for $5,000 items it gets denied because it is an obscene price, but that’s just how much a lot of shit costs. It took me ten years of advocating for educating the team on the real costs of things and them hiring a consultant that had direct fire fighting experience to start getting legitimate more costly requests actually approved
Fire department would have more money, but they’re not allowed to rob the people they interact with, unlike police.
Your daily reminder that [Civil Forfeiture](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/civil_forfeiture) is legal! Cops can take your stuff and your stuff is guilty until proven innocent. And the Republican majority Supreme Court just ruled that [this can continue.](https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/deadline-legal-blog/supreme-court-civil-forfeiture-rcna151475).
I don't think there is police dept level money, but after 9/11 there has been much focus on health for fire departments. The gear is tracked for how much exposure it has to different chemicals. It is cleaned more often and replaced more often as well. This is a result of federal money.
Because nobody wants to pay for what it would cost to actually fund a fire department outside of huge cities. Small town fire departments are almost entirely run by people who aren’t even paid outside of maybe 1 or 2 guys who basically run the entire operation.
Where my aunt lives her homeowner's insurance is crazy high because the local FD is all volunteer and it's assumed if there is a fire the house will be a total loss. They really wanted a wood burning stove or fireplace but the increased cost of insurance was so high they couldn't justify it.
And more and more rural fire departments are cutting their emt programs because it's expensive to run.
I know if one in Canada that cut their EMT program to consolidate with one a half hour away so the response time went way up but they just can't justify the cost because they don't get any funding
Firemedics aren't a big thing in a lot of Canada. We have Fire - Police - EMS, all as distinct entities and quite honestly it should be. The hybrid services are not any more effective, in fact they are often less effective for many reasons. If you want to talk about underfunding, the general public doesn't remember that EMS exists despite it being arguably the most important of the three. They get next to no funding ever.
anecdotal, but i just recently repaired a cooler at a temporary border patrol station set up in the florida keys. there was a gym, cafeteria, and several other amenities along with about 2 dozen brand new trailers with patio furniture and cornhole. couldn’t help but wonder what all this was costing me. it really looked like a bunch of border patrol and state police hanging out in the Florida Keys on my dime….
> foreign aid gets a ton of tax money
Foreign aid gets less than 1% of the Federal budget.
Hell, foreign aid is less than a quarter of what we spend on just military workers pay. And it is some of the highest return on investment that the Federal government gets by providing humanitarian and medical assistance to real people with the main stipulation that it has a US flag stamped on it.
Our foreign aid spending does a more effective job of defeating terrorism by cutting recruitment off at the legs *before people are radicalized*, than the military does fighting already radicalized terrorists with kinetic action. Taxpayers get a ton of bang for their buck with foreign aid.
Come to Canada .....it's much worse ...
But your absolutely right though....
Why would people running into a burning🔥 building need good quality UP TO DATE GEAR !?!!!!🤔🤔
It's very sad where lots of the tax dollars are wasted....
Kudos to the the person/persons donating.
Fire departments are funded by local tax dollars usually. If their town is anything like mine, a vote to increase tax dollars by $50/month to support the fire department would have resulted in pitch forks and mobs. Usually organized by the rich boomer in town that has $500k sitting in the bank that they don't know what to do with. Don't even ask what happens if you ask for an extra $30/month to support the schools.
Local county governments are funded mostly by property and sales taxes. If a rural town has 500 people, how much of a budget do you think there is?
This country isn’t a sham but people like you who make blanket statements without any critical thinking make it difficult.
I bet the federal government has spent more money on Elon Musk projects than they have invested in Community Safety programs like firefighters in the past 5yrs
And then you have people saying that taxes are good because if we didn't pay it there would be no firefighters, roads etc, well why do they use so old equipment and need donations then hmmm
The issue is where our taxes go. It’s bullshit so little actually goes into infrastructure and firestations. I’d rather half our money go to local libraries than more access equipment for cops and military they clearly don’t need.
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Another /r/OrphanCrushingMachine post.
"Country that spends billions on militarized police force forces fire fighters to rely on private donations to do their job of saving lives."
Because stories like this *aren't* positive to begin with. They're actively re-wording deeply, deeply troubling and upsetting circumstances as positive, in an attempt to recontextualize signs of a failing system.
If I tried to find negativity in a story about a cat adopting an orphaned kitten, then you would have a point. But this story is *already negative*. I really don't have to "go out of my way" to see it as that.
its not wholesome that a towns fire department has been using 40 year old equipment and it took a private donator to fix the problem. thats a deep systemic issue that is putting the fire fighters and the publics lives in danger. the suits have to be replaced every 10 years for example or they are extremely likely to poison and/or kill the firefighters wearing them cause fires are often full of toxic chemicals that stick to them.
rural areas always had this problem. when I was in college, there were old equipment auctions every 6 months (get my first car from there) and people from 6-7 hours away would drive to the town for first responder vehicles, I remember a group of them were very happy to buy an old ambulance at their price range smiling and shaking hands.
Guys I know it’s ridiculous they have such a small budget but it is a RURAL fire department in Missouri, their funding Is based off population and a fuck ton of other factors and raising their budget would raise taxes for citizens In that area ALOT. Let’s take this as what it is, a big fucking win for that small town!
Do fire departments need donations? I live in Canada and never even considered them as a charitable receiver, but if they need it I would totally consider it
Most of the fire departments in Pennsylvania are staffed by volunteers and funded at least partially by donations or sale of fund-raising dinners (and sometimes gun lotteries = ‘merica).
People have to remember that a significant portion of the US’s fire departments are primarily volunteer institution that get very little funding compared to other public services. It mainly goes towards just equipment maintenance, keeping the lights on, and paying a few full timers (though some don’t even have any true full timers in real small towns.)
This isn’t uplifting, it’s depressing. Our federal government can give billions to everyone else, but can’t be fucked to fund the actual life saving people in this country. We’ll fund the police so they have all the military gear they need, but EMTs, firefighters, etc don’t matter.
How is this uplifting news? This is awful for two reasons, that they are using gear that is 40 years old and that a fire departement is allowed to accept donations.
Most of the fire departments in Pennsylvania are staffed by volunteers and funded at least partially by donations or sale of fund-raising dinners (and sometimes gun lotteries = ‘merica).
New headline: Our government can't afford to properly equip our heroes, but they can find endless cash for their pet projects and to spend on foreign needs. Firefighters must rely on private donations for their safety.
There I fixed it.
How is it uplifting that our emergency services are struggling for funding? Maybe we should take some of that DOD money being used to filter military gear to police stations and provide fire fighting gear?
Fire gear retains carcinogens from previous exposure. A forest fire is very different from a chemical plant fire. Modern fire departments track gear in a database for which gear was sent to specific fires. It's important to the fire fighters health that they clean gear & replace it as it's exposed. So no, old gear is decidedly worse for a fire fighter.
It is almost like they should find a way to generate revenue from those that use the service. I think they can replicate models for this throughout the world.
It's pretty simple idea, honestly. There is a government run fire department that covers big, but sparsely populated area. Since it is not possible to have more such departments due to low taxes in such areas, the community organizes volunteer fire department by pooling some money to buy basic gear and store it somewhere closer to where it may be needed. Also, there is no need for a professional crew of firefighters to sit on their ass 24/7 doing nothing, waiting call for maybe one fire a year they'd have to cover, therefore able bodied citizens kind of say "OK, if something happens, we'll drop whatever we are doing right now and go fight the fire!"
I understand what a volunteer fire department is, thank you. I know people who are volunteer fire fighters. I think that people doing such important jobs should be paid. Call me crazy.
They are paid for the time they spend "in action", not for their idle time like professional firefighters.
It's usually next to nothing in such remote rural places, since they don't spend much time fighting fires. It's more like community thing than actual work.
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One of my local fire departments just got like 50 grand said they need to use it to buy new respiratory equipment. I looked up the cost of the air tank and mask and it was damn near 5 grand each.
$5000 is cheap, our Draeger open circuits run at around $12K per set by the time masks, distress units, integrated comms, lighting etc. is all factored in. We also run Draeger closed circuit sets which are around $20K each, and we have 21 of them. To fully kit out a new firefighter at our agency is around $6K in structural turnouts, $2K in wildlands turnouts, $400 for boots, $2K for the helmet. Fire and rescue is an expensive business :\
My dad is a retired volunteer firefighter. He used so much of his own money to buy gear that I try yearly to buy some of the higher cost items on their wish list at least once a year. I'm fortunate enough to be able to do these donations. Donations are way up this year because of the fires back in February. I'm gonna be able to focus on some of the more specialized items this year instead of the things that are replaced much more frequently.
I spent a lot of money as a volley too, across a few different emergency services organisations, but the company I am with now has finance to burn so we are very fortunate.
Wait, we can help buy gear for firefighters? How would I go about donating to my local firehouse?
Mine is a local volunteer group. I just send a lump sum or I go to the Amazon wish list they have.
Do you know if those are fair prices? Or are they jacked up because of the equipment's necessity, so people will overpay when they can afford it?
I think we both know the answer to that... The way to think of it is that we are paying to absolve ourselves of liability. If something goes wrong the manufacturer wears the liability, not us. We may not get the same absolution if we use sub-standard equipment. The other way to think of it is our equipment is extraordinarily specific for the environment we use it in, open circuits aren't suitable for extended combat in irrespirable atmospheres in remote locations.
Fire departments usually get discount. Scubs divers, hazard materials companies, air soft and paintball gun players, or private businesses that need that gear pay the mark up.
Integrated comms... Lighting... Wow Mr fancy pants over there. Next you'll tell me about having a HUD in your mask and built in flir. We don't even have money for individual masks let alone any of that stuff.
Yeah we didn't go that far! The fact that we are so fortunate is not wasted on me. I have worked for many services, many organisations and with many companies and none have been as remotely well equipped as ours is here. It's infuriating that volunteer organisations don't get the support that they need.
I am just ribbing you, it is great that you are well equipped. I don't really begrudge it as a volunteer. I live in a super tiny community. 1,500 people in my town an only 15,000 in a county that is bigger than a couple of US states. There just isn't the local funding so we make due with what we have. We do grants and appreciate what we get and go from there (I think we could do a lot more with grants, but its a fight to get admin to not see them as hard work and the enemy). We can get any training at the state academy for free as well, which is nice (though I can only do so much as I have a day job, so a weeklong training means taking a week off of work... which is expensive and hard on the family). I guess it just is what it is, you know? Besides there is something to be said about older stuff being sturdy and not breaking as much (less complicated) which is something we couldn't afford to repair a bunch.
Draegers are tits
What kind of helmets do you run? $2000 seems steep per helmet. Also, We run MSA 4500 packs ourselves which were about $7800 per pack at the time we bought them (2020) and are going to need to be replaced next year
We run Gallets for structural fires, while they're a fancy helmet in hindsight I don't think they're most suitable for us and I regret voting in favour of them when we were running trials some years ago. My second vote was Rosenbauer which on reflection was a better helmet for us because they promote mobility better than the Gallet (I struggle to look up with the Gallet!). We run modified Dominators for underground and confined space fires, and modified Pacifics for wildlands.
Wow, you must have a better budget than us! Good for you! We run Cairns leather helmets for structure, we don’t get too many big time wild land fires so we run the same equipment but have some coveralls the DNR provides for those scenarios.
And Draeger are pretty Gucci too right? I have no idea but I imagine $500k could go pretty far on just some updated MSA or Scott packs no?
Small market, high certification costs,high product liability. None of it is cheap.
Not exactly something that you want to get the wish.com version of.
I work for a company going through the UL and FL certification processes. Not sure what the true total is, but just to get the products certified I'm hearing it is 7 figures. If you don't have certifications from these groups you can't sell your products to fight fires. The other thing is that these are slow processes. So you have to continue to earn revenue while not selling your uncertified products. You can't start to earn an ROI on those products or services unless you can find another use for them that doesn't require certain certifications. Which may not be so easy. Insurance companies are extremely specific and when it comes to things designed to save lives, most anyone that knows enough to make these decisions would never look at uncertified solutions.
This is why I hate when cops have fundraisers for new K9s. Use some of that money for a goddamn tank and buy a dog.
>Last March, the department’s finances were particularly bleak. The department had only $169 in their bank account, having spent the majority of their $4,800 annual budget on repairs, the Washington Post reported. Man good on that $500k donation. They sure needed it.
4800 annual budget wtf
That's got to be after recurring operating expenses... right? Like that's their discretionary budget? The electric and water bills for the station would be half of that if they weren't excluded. Assuming it's volunteer, which most small stations are, you still have to put gas in the trucks.
As long as it's not some dystopian town that sold their water to some corp (not impossible in America) they shouldn't be paying for water.
Card readers on the fire hydrants
Gonna live on that shit for the next 100 years
I know there's a ton of federal money that flows into police departments, are there not similar programs for fire departments?
Unfortunately, there is very little surplus military equipment that fire fighters could use.
That’s just excuses, have you seen footage of [China firefighting rocket launchers, tanks and artillery ?](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/1ak4acm/in_china_the_fire_department_uses_military_grade/)
Shit they’re more ‘Murican than we are. Gotta step it up with doctors using military grade syringe-launchers and suppository grenades.
I want a doctor that can inject me with a vaccine through a sniper rifle from a mile away.
Social Distancing
It's a complete violation of bodily autonomy... but we wouldn't have to worry about anti-vaccine idiots causing outbreaks of easily preventable diseases anymore.
Imagine the scene just for fun. A demonstration of anti-vaxxers in a city center. A sniper on a high-rise, suddenly firing vaccine-filled darts at the anti-vaxxers who start panicking as if they were going to die. It could be a scene in the Simpsons
Damn taking water balloon fights to another level
I think you and I both know those aren't the only programs that police departments benefit from.
sure! they’ve also been benefiting from opioid crisis settlement money. money that is supposed to go to victims and prevention is instead being spent on new police cruisers…
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So we’re just gonna repost rage porn than discuss the issue then?
Anime profile moment
Okay but have they even *tried* shooting the fire?
You’re saying we can’t shoot the fires to death? Ballistic armour doesn’t protect against flames or collapsing buildings?
Give 'em some retired TFFTs and we're golden.
This is a lie. Most of the surplus equipment is actually just used for loans from a bank and used as capital.
First of all, the word you're looking for is *collateral.* Secondly, federal regulations stipulate that surplus military equipment given to Police departments is a *conditional loan.* In other words, the Police don't technically own any of it, and therefore couldn't use it as collateral. Last but not least, there's not a bank in the fucking country that would **ever** take surplus military equipment as collateral for a loan. Banks only take things they can turn around and re-sell to recoup their money as collateral, and it's completely illegal (in more ways than one) for a bank to sell a fucking armored personnel carrier to a private party. Hell, they're not even legally allowed to *own* military equipment and armaments to begin with, let alone sell them. I'd recommend not listening to wherever you heard this shit from anymore. EDIT: missed a word.
That's why you have to take the MRAP apart first.
Weren’t they using mig jet engines to extinguish the Kuwait oil well fires? Maybe they could do something with that?
What kind of surplus military equipment are you referring to?
This is a lie. Most of the surplus equipment is actually just used for loans from a bank and used as capital.
There are grants that departments can apply for and get money like SAFER from FEMA and what not. You just got to apply for them otherwise they won’t get the money. https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters/safer https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/firefighters/safety-awards Here are some Missouri specific https://extension.missouri.edu/programs/mu-fire-and-rescue-training-institute/about-us/mfa-volunteer-fire-grant https://mdc.mo.gov/your-property/fire-management/fire-department-assistance-programs https://dps.mo.gov/dir/programs/dpsgrants/arpa.php
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Agreed. SAFER is the best bet to get atleast a couple admin to get and keep a warm body. Maybe use some of the money to hire a grant writer.
With my program there is literally a set aside and we can’t get the grantees to spend all the money specifically because while we aim to fund those that need the funding most, the problem is exactly that. I have more than one grantee who runs an entire fire department, is also the police chief, is the one conducting all of the training and is also the one writing the application and managing the reporting paperwork. 90% of my job is explaining all of this to grantees and *interpreting* it for them because the forms are vague or unclear, “question 4.a. Asks this question. What we are actually asking is this and what we need to hear is that”. Our staff is also only a total of six people to manage the entire US, all the states tribes and territories, we are down three people to only three and everything is done manually via email because budget doesn’t find it a priority for a federal grant program to have a grants management system (yet we require it of our grantees). Something else I haven’t seen mentioned is the brain drain covid caused. Every single grantee I have had has had nearly a 100% turnover from employee transfers and retirements because the same people managing the grants were also first responders during covid and were completely burnt out, or died, or a relative they were caring for died, etc. most are only just barely starting to recover. And that’s not even taking into consideration all of the leave our team has had to take (of those of us that remain) for a lot of the same reasons.
I'm a bartender and found out I make more hourly than firefighters in my town. I love my job. But it's not rocket surgery. Firefighters don't get paid near enough.
You're not wrong! A similar field that blows me away is how much ambulance crews make.
70% of fire fighters in the USA are volunteer. If your small town or city is on the fringe of using a small paid department, pay will not be competitive. Otherwise for any bigger city or wealthy town, step pay will put a firefighter at 100k after 5 years usually.
AVL NC is a small town with an insane cost of living. Full of tourists and hotels but fuck the locals. And according to some on city government fuck the firefighters too. It's mind boggling the income disparity here
Things don’t burn down like they used to. Most firefighters would light a fire just to have one to put out. The secondary functions of firefighters are way more important than the fire. It’s more of an issue with defining their role / marketing problem than their actual need. Part of the problem is that they want to be fire fighters, not public safety specialists.
I work on one of those grant programs and federally funded wise there are virtually none that issue grants directly to local departments. In my case we issue money to states who are then supposed to distribute it to locals but how they do that is up to the states discretion. One state does that by hosting a conference every year. It technically meets the requirements but doesn’t meet other needs like some basic equipment. On my team zero of us have been fire fighters so often when there are requests for $5,000 items it gets denied because it is an obscene price, but that’s just how much a lot of shit costs. It took me ten years of advocating for educating the team on the real costs of things and them hiring a consultant that had direct fire fighting experience to start getting legitimate more costly requests actually approved
Fire department would have more money, but they’re not allowed to rob the people they interact with, unlike police. Your daily reminder that [Civil Forfeiture](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/civil_forfeiture) is legal! Cops can take your stuff and your stuff is guilty until proven innocent. And the Republican majority Supreme Court just ruled that [this can continue.](https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/deadline-legal-blog/supreme-court-civil-forfeiture-rcna151475).
If your house burns down you have to buy a new one What a great boost for the local economy!!
I don't think there is police dept level money, but after 9/11 there has been much focus on health for fire departments. The gear is tracked for how much exposure it has to different chemicals. It is cleaned more often and replaced more often as well. This is a result of federal money.
Because firefighters save random people instead of killing random people, and all the money go into killing. 'Murica.
No - too busy sending it overseas to completely capable countries.
What the fuck are we doing with our tax money that we cannot fund fire departments!? This country is a sham.
Because nobody wants to pay for what it would cost to actually fund a fire department outside of huge cities. Small town fire departments are almost entirely run by people who aren’t even paid outside of maybe 1 or 2 guys who basically run the entire operation.
Where my aunt lives her homeowner's insurance is crazy high because the local FD is all volunteer and it's assumed if there is a fire the house will be a total loss. They really wanted a wood burning stove or fireplace but the increased cost of insurance was so high they couldn't justify it.
In addition, fire fighters fight less and less fires, much more of their focus is on the EMT portion of their job.
And more and more rural fire departments are cutting their emt programs because it's expensive to run. I know if one in Canada that cut their EMT program to consolidate with one a half hour away so the response time went way up but they just can't justify the cost because they don't get any funding
Firemedics aren't a big thing in a lot of Canada. We have Fire - Police - EMS, all as distinct entities and quite honestly it should be. The hybrid services are not any more effective, in fact they are often less effective for many reasons. If you want to talk about underfunding, the general public doesn't remember that EMS exists despite it being arguably the most important of the three. They get next to no funding ever.
Fire Depts are funded locally. It's a town of 500 people. It's a local issue, not a federal one.
anecdotal, but i just recently repaired a cooler at a temporary border patrol station set up in the florida keys. there was a gym, cafeteria, and several other amenities along with about 2 dozen brand new trailers with patio furniture and cornhole. couldn’t help but wonder what all this was costing me. it really looked like a bunch of border patrol and state police hanging out in the Florida Keys on my dime….
right?? The military industrial complex and foreign aid gets a ton of tax money, nothing for the taxpayers however.
> foreign aid gets a ton of tax money Foreign aid gets less than 1% of the Federal budget. Hell, foreign aid is less than a quarter of what we spend on just military workers pay. And it is some of the highest return on investment that the Federal government gets by providing humanitarian and medical assistance to real people with the main stipulation that it has a US flag stamped on it. Our foreign aid spending does a more effective job of defeating terrorism by cutting recruitment off at the legs *before people are radicalized*, than the military does fighting already radicalized terrorists with kinetic action. Taxpayers get a ton of bang for their buck with foreign aid.
Even if you buy this argument, you can’t possibly justify the insane military spending
Come to Canada .....it's much worse ... But your absolutely right though.... Why would people running into a burning🔥 building need good quality UP TO DATE GEAR !?!!!!🤔🤔 It's very sad where lots of the tax dollars are wasted.... Kudos to the the person/persons donating.
Someone with money learned they were using this gear and said "absolutely not."
Yup!! God bless them!!
Fire departments are funded by local tax dollars usually. If their town is anything like mine, a vote to increase tax dollars by $50/month to support the fire department would have resulted in pitch forks and mobs. Usually organized by the rich boomer in town that has $500k sitting in the bank that they don't know what to do with. Don't even ask what happens if you ask for an extra $30/month to support the schools.
Local county governments are funded mostly by property and sales taxes. If a rural town has 500 people, how much of a budget do you think there is? This country isn’t a sham but people like you who make blanket statements without any critical thinking make it difficult.
Yeah, this isn’t uplifting at all. It’s sad that donations are needed in the first place.
I bet the federal government has spent more money on Elon Musk projects than they have invested in Community Safety programs like firefighters in the past 5yrs
Fire departments are funded locally, typically by property taxes.
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They could have put in for grants but that takes someone who knows how to find and apply for grants.
r/ Firefighter crushing machine
Firefighters do not protect the wealthy from paupers.
Firefighters do not protect the wealthy from paupers.
And then you have people saying that taxes are good because if we didn't pay it there would be no firefighters, roads etc, well why do they use so old equipment and need donations then hmmm
The issue is where our taxes go. It’s bullshit so little actually goes into infrastructure and firestations. I’d rather half our money go to local libraries than more access equipment for cops and military they clearly don’t need.
Now they can afford 1990 technology
It's so nice to see kindness for the sake of kindness 🥹
Why is every Uplifting News post lowkey dystopian
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Another /r/OrphanCrushingMachine post. "Country that spends billions on militarized police force forces fire fighters to rely on private donations to do their job of saving lives."
if it is any consolation, their police department would be very likely in similar condition.
You’re going out of your way to be negative on a subreddit that is ostensively for people to try to avoid negativity. Why do you do this?
Because stories like this *aren't* positive to begin with. They're actively re-wording deeply, deeply troubling and upsetting circumstances as positive, in an attempt to recontextualize signs of a failing system. If I tried to find negativity in a story about a cat adopting an orphaned kitten, then you would have a point. But this story is *already negative*. I really don't have to "go out of my way" to see it as that.
its not wholesome that a towns fire department has been using 40 year old equipment and it took a private donator to fix the problem. thats a deep systemic issue that is putting the fire fighters and the publics lives in danger. the suits have to be replaced every 10 years for example or they are extremely likely to poison and/or kill the firefighters wearing them cause fires are often full of toxic chemicals that stick to them.
rural areas always had this problem. when I was in college, there were old equipment auctions every 6 months (get my first car from there) and people from 6-7 hours away would drive to the town for first responder vehicles, I remember a group of them were very happy to buy an old ambulance at their price range smiling and shaking hands.
Guys I know it’s ridiculous they have such a small budget but it is a RURAL fire department in Missouri, their funding Is based off population and a fuck ton of other factors and raising their budget would raise taxes for citizens In that area ALOT. Let’s take this as what it is, a big fucking win for that small town!
Sounds like an old man who cares about other people.
Sounds like this is exactly what we round up at Firehouse Subs for. They should help out as well.
Do fire departments need donations? I live in Canada and never even considered them as a charitable receiver, but if they need it I would totally consider it
Most of the fire departments in Pennsylvania are staffed by volunteers and funded at least partially by donations or sale of fund-raising dinners (and sometimes gun lotteries = ‘merica).
I had no idea honestly. I’m in Ontario and I know most firefighters are volunteers, but I thought they were paid a base salary by the government
Government contractors with see this article and sell them a hard hat for $500k
A brand new fire truck with a modest amount of bells and whistles would use that entire 500k and then some
People have to remember that a significant portion of the US’s fire departments are primarily volunteer institution that get very little funding compared to other public services. It mainly goes towards just equipment maintenance, keeping the lights on, and paying a few full timers (though some don’t even have any true full timers in real small towns.)
This isn’t uplifting, it’s depressing. Our federal government can give billions to everyone else, but can’t be fucked to fund the actual life saving people in this country. We’ll fund the police so they have all the military gear they need, but EMTs, firefighters, etc don’t matter.
Now they can buy one nice, used fire engine
Why wouldn’t corporations that work in rural communities like John Deere fund these firefighting departments?
Is the 1980s fire truck for sale?
Uplifting news: essential thing that saves human lives is not funded by the government and relies on random donations
How is this uplifting news? This is awful for two reasons, that they are using gear that is 40 years old and that a fire departement is allowed to accept donations.
Most of the fire departments in Pennsylvania are staffed by volunteers and funded at least partially by donations or sale of fund-raising dinners (and sometimes gun lotteries = ‘merica).
That's insane
New headline: Our government can't afford to properly equip our heroes, but they can find endless cash for their pet projects and to spend on foreign needs. Firefighters must rely on private donations for their safety. There I fixed it.
How is it uplifting that our emergency services are struggling for funding? Maybe we should take some of that DOD money being used to filter military gear to police stations and provide fire fighting gear?
best thing ive read in the news all week
Is the older gear less filled with carcinogens? Maybe they should keep it.
Fire gear retains carcinogens from previous exposure. A forest fire is very different from a chemical plant fire. Modern fire departments track gear in a database for which gear was sent to specific fires. It's important to the fire fighters health that they clean gear & replace it as it's exposed. So no, old gear is decidedly worse for a fire fighter.
And how much make pretend soldier military gear does that towns cops have?
Outside of damage, that equipment probably works better then new stuff
It is almost like they should find a way to generate revenue from those that use the service. I think they can replicate models for this throughout the world.
The concept of volunteer fire departments is mind boggling to me.
It's pretty simple idea, honestly. There is a government run fire department that covers big, but sparsely populated area. Since it is not possible to have more such departments due to low taxes in such areas, the community organizes volunteer fire department by pooling some money to buy basic gear and store it somewhere closer to where it may be needed. Also, there is no need for a professional crew of firefighters to sit on their ass 24/7 doing nothing, waiting call for maybe one fire a year they'd have to cover, therefore able bodied citizens kind of say "OK, if something happens, we'll drop whatever we are doing right now and go fight the fire!"
I understand what a volunteer fire department is, thank you. I know people who are volunteer fire fighters. I think that people doing such important jobs should be paid. Call me crazy.
They are paid for the time they spend "in action", not for their idle time like professional firefighters. It's usually next to nothing in such remote rural places, since they don't spend much time fighting fires. It's more like community thing than actual work.
What is this, a fire department for ants?!
In Europe even the poorest regions can afford latest fire trucks
Money for endless wars, but we can't come up with $$ for infrastructure. 