Abc news article about oak brook illinois. "fire the firefighters one by one"

[Aidey]

I'm not going to quote every one of your posts JP, but some info for you.

There are a large amount of people who feel that a city's public service employees should be required to live in the city they work. The last 2 places I have lived this has been a major arguing point, with a very vocal group saying that all employees should be required to live within the city limits, applied retroactively, current property owned be damned. I know these areas are no the only ones who have people making this argument. So it may not be that people feel it is their "right" to live in the city they work in, it may be that they are required to. If they are being required to, they need to be paid a living wage for living in that city.

These FF/Medics are being paid from the mid 50s to the mid 60's. The rest is made up of their benefits and associated costs. I would say they are actually underpaid for that area, try and buy a house within 10 miles of Oak Brook with that salary, you won't get far. That being said, I've spent a good amount of time in Oak Brook, and the surrounding areas. This is not an area where you go 5 minutes down the road and run into a low income section. This is a very very wealthy area surrounded by very wealthy areas.

Where I used to live the FD serves about 35,000 people, has twice the staff, and 1/3 of the median income and home values, and each FF costs the city about the same. Salary ranges are similar, and total costs are around $100,000 per employee, per year. I suspect that if someone was willing to do some research their costs are similar to the costs at many departments, including those from areas with significantly lower mean salaries and housing costs.

 

[LonghornMedic]

I think the larger message this guy was trying to get across is that firefighters have been, for a lack of better words, fleecing the public. Since 9/11, FF and their unions have done a masterful job at pulling at the heartstrings of the country. In return they got some very good pay, equipment and benefits. Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Clark County FD, for example, all lived high on the hog since 9/11 and now are so bloated with high salaries that their respective councils are cutting back FD budgets and letting some of them go(in N. Las Vegas). Their unions of course are not willing to budge at all. They are not willing to give up any of their ridiculously high wages in a city where housing and cost of living has plummeted. They have FF making around $100,000 with some making upwards of $200,000. Now they can't give back 5%? Oh no, that would just bankrupt the poor FF. So instead, because of the way their contract is set up, the City of Las Vegas laid off other city employees, including some City Marshals. So because the union and its FF are so greedy, other hard working employees, including cops, lost their jobs so these guys could continue to work 10 days a month while pulling in $100,000 a year. This is happening all across the country. Communities are finally waking up to realize how the FF unions have taken up huge chunks of budgets and when asked to do their part to help out, they balk! In return, FF are complaining that they don't feel appreciated. We all appreciate FF and the hard work they do, but it's time to bring salaries back down to earth. FF have dangerous jobs, but so do cops and most cops aren't pulling down $100,000 a year. And most cops work 5 days a week, plus time for court appearances. And don't even get me started on EMS pay! EMS is grossly under appreciated and under paid. So I have little sympathy towards FF griping about taking a 5% pay cut. All done, off my sap box.

 

[46Young]

...so basically... it's not really any more different than any other job where you plan on getting promoted then short of taking job competencies and giving a merit badge? You go through the inital education (be it outside education from the company or internal training), go through a specific training time, and then work to maintain competency and learn new skills. The only difference is an advertising company doesn't offer scripting 1, 2, and 3. They just expect their commercial writers to be able to do their job. I've always found it amazing that some fields have to think their special for doing things that other fields do themselves.

Edit:

I'd also like to add that in the real world, people don't get overtime for drills. An emergency department does an MCI drill? They don't call people in on their day off, they just do the drill. The local EMS coordination system wants to run a dry run through of the MCI patient tracking software ("Redinet" where I am), an extra radio nurse doesn't come on duty. Sorry, but when your job is to be "engaged to wait" (IIRC, is the specific labor law phrase), then training is a valid part of your job and considered by everyone else as "work", not something that gets thrown up as "years of training required." Otherwise "years of training" is just synonymous with the real world term "job experience."

Where did I say that we drill on OT? We do all our in station drills, company ops, multi unit drills, and EMS CME's on duty, either in service for the in station drills, or out of service for the MUD's and EMS CME's. We also have quaterly OOS OARS training at the academy, which sometimes involves company ops, combined fire and EMS scenarios, testing new equipment, infectious control refreshers, ePCR training, fire protection systems, just to name a few things. In comparison, at my old hospital they used to give CME's as OT after end of shift, and at my old third service, they had us do six hours of monthly CME's, also on the big clock.

Personally, I see no fault in how our personnel are trained, and how our promotional process is structured.

The initial academy training is only a foundation, the bare essentials. The rookie year is intended to solidify the probie's skills and knowledge, and also for them to build upon that, and also learn the dept's specific SOP's and various operating manuals. It would be very cost ineffective to keep a recruit in an academy for a whole year or two when istead you have them as minimal staffing in the field where they're guided by their Master Tech, their officers, and the other firefighters. Even after the rookie year, those drills and OOS training serves to improve all personnel to better serve the public. It's not like having an accounting degree, a nursing degree, or something similar, where you're expected to do it all after an orientation period. There's a huge amount of information and skills to retain and improve upon, as well as various specialties such as fire investigations, HazMat, TROT, etc.

The old stereotype is that we just sit around playing cards, X-Box, or watching movies all day. The reality is, we're doing all those drills and evolutions I mentioned previously, as well as building walkthroughs, public education, station cleaning, equipment maitenance, PT, and such. Personal time allocations when not on calls are dictated by the station commander. This is typically after 2000-2200. Some of the busier stations will allow crews to attempt short naps, provided that all work is completed, so that they're better prepared to run high call volume at night. We earn our pay. That downtime that a few have remarked about is typically filled with those activities I've described.

Regarding career advancement, there really is no perfect system. The merit based system was created to ensure that there is no discrimination and favoritism. Your list score is determined by your objective test score, a practical scenario if applicable, oral boards, a small bump for time in grade, and formal education. The time in grade tops out after eleven years, and is only around 5% of the score. Education carries increasing weight the higher up you go in rank. I understand whn some say that promotion should be done on an individual basis, but favoritism will always play a role. Our merit based process requires that the candidates do intense study for the position, sometimes as much as six months out from the exam date. Education cannot be ignored, obviously. There are no giveaways. The material that we're being tested on is relevant to the position. List positions can be decided by tenths of a point, so each candidate is doing their best to prepare for the position. Everyone is treated equally, and their list position is entirely up to them. The OFC/INS I, II, and III are all appropriate for each rank, I for LT, II for Capt I, and III for Capt II and above.

 

[Veneficus]

If I could just point out...

I started in a suburb where we could go weeks without a call and the pay was really great. Nobody on that roster should have been paid what they were.

In larger or busier departments, the idea of sitting around playing cards, etc. is not exactly accurate.

Sure, in larger depts some companies are busier than others. But there is usually more than enough work to go around. The last fire company I was on could see 2-3 structure fires a day, often with 1 one a shift, any number of EMS responses, as well as other types of responses. The engine in the same quarters didn't do 1/2 that many calls, but they had their fair share too. We also got paid less than the initial place I worked. (But I am proud to know I saw more fire in a week than many of those suburban guys will see in a career. A few months ago a local suburban captain saw the first fire in his 20year career and they did a write up about it in the paper.)

Nothing in EMS short of an MCI or natural disaster equates to the physical activity of fire suppresion. Especially in the extremes of climate.

It is absolutely inaccurate to compare firefighting with jobs that require more thinking than physical labor. I don't know anyone in healthcare that dresses in 60+ lbs of gear and then engages in some lifting, carrying, dragging, and climbing in an environment not suitable to life one or more times on a busy day. Even using a hydraulic spreader is far more work than pushing the IV cart or any other gear in the hospital over to a patient.

It s not just about physical labor either. In larger departments, and now in some smaller ones as well, a degree is required for any meaningful career advancement. Which at the present time is more than can be said for easily 95% of US EMS.

It is absolutely unsafe to not have down time when engaged in that level of activity, both for providers and, for lack of a better term, callers.

On EMS side, I have worked EMS stations that could never see a station in 12hours doing only 911, with shift change on the road. I have worked stations where 14 "legit" ALS calls in 24 hours was not unheard of and 4 hours of downtime was an easy shift. But even that was an easy day compared to a moderate day of being on a rescue company.

Emergency response is not like working in a hospital. I don't think firefighters should be paid in the $100,000s (excluding benefits which can really run up the cost of a firefighter) because the local tax base supports it or tries to.

But the fire service does need to be paid fairly. Which includes OT for off duty drills or any other duty if it exceeds the hours in a pay period or requires special education or skills.

If an Attending physician, or any other hospital worker, on salary worked the alloted hours in a period (I know only a few hospitals pay physicians a salary) I would not expect that physician or person to come in on off time for nothing to run a drill either. Nor would I expect them to obtain special credentials, or perform special duties that other physicians didn't without an increase in their compensation.

I agree that the fire service is usually run extremely inefficently. I agree that some union locals have gone way too far. But these incidents are not the normal examples of pay in my experience. It has been long known that the wealthier suburb firefighters do less "work" than the larger city counter parts for less pay. But that is a system issue that plagues the whole country.

In my opinion the firefighter in the wealthy section outside of chicago shouldn't earn a dime more than the firefighter on the busiest company in chicago, infact the chicago person should earn more. But getting that to happen is about as likely as EMS getting proper pay also.

If these firefighters don't want to take a pay cut, they are free to leave. There are more than a few people who would take their place in a heartbeat. Including some from big city departments that may not earn that in any rank in their respective dept.

 

[Aidey]

Vene - The issue is their pay is not out of line, "Oak Brook has 28 firefighters or firefighter/paramedics, with a per position cost of over $100,000/year. Salary range for firefighter/paramedic is $51,016 – $68,871." ~$69 is on the high end of things, but if someone is a 20 year FF/Medic I don't think that is out of line. Where I am right now a 5 year FF/EMT pulls in $71,000 (Yes, I am aware that is absurd).

 

[Veneficus]

Vene - The issue is their pay is not out of line, "Oak Brook has 28 firefighters or firefighter/paramedics, with a per position cost of over $100,000/year. Salary range for firefighter/paramedic is $51,016 – $68,871." ~$69 is on the high end of things, but if someone is a 20 year FF/Medic I don't think that is out of line. Where I am right now a 5 year FF/EMT pulls in $71,000 (Yes, I am aware that is absurd).

it is out of line if they don't have to live in that neighborhood.

 

[Aidey]

How so? The surrounding area is pretty much the same. The area I live in has a median income of around $37,000.