Austin Travis County EMS hiring Paramedics and paying them as Basics

Oh, and we have brand new bunker gear on our rural units where it would most likely be used, thank you very much.
 
You don't have to be angry that I proved my point.
 
Hmmm...let's create a little scoreboard of opinions vesus facts.

teedubbyaw said:
Let's start with the overly long academy that spends more time worried about military style PE.
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Refuted by an actual employee of ATCEMS. And "overly long" is definitely an opinion.

Bunker gear for every new cadet? Bunker gear that they don't use.
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Apparently true...except for the part about them not using it. And the idea that they shouldn't have it...another opinion. So let's call it 1 for each.

SCBA's for every new cadet...again, that they never use.
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Refuted by an actual employee of ATCEMS.

Wet suits for every new cadet...that they never use because they don't do water rescues.
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Refuted by an actual employee of ATCEMS.

Their extensive uniform list.
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Refuted by an actual employee of ATCEMS. And apparently an opinion that having several uniforms is a bad thing. Apparently someone never get's their uniform dirty...odd.

Class A's so they can wear at graduation?
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Pure opinion that having class A's is a bad thing.

List goes on.
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I'd ask that you go on with your list...buuuut...since by my count the scoreboard is now at 1 fact, 4 opinions and 4 falsehoods...well...you said it:
teedubbyaw said:
Opinions = trolling.

Facts = trolling.
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Uh-oh...
 
teedubbyaw said:
Do you have an agency with 500+ employees that all get issued scba's and do you think it's a good financial decision to buy that many people personal bunker gear?

Didn't think so.
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Didn't realize we allocate PPE based on agency size, that makes no sense. No we don't have 500 employees. Our budget is less than two million dollars for our 15 fulltime staff however. Really not far off based on percentages.
 
Tigger said:
Didn't realize we allocate PPE based on agency size, that makes no sense. No we don't have 500 employees. Our budget is less than two million dollars for our 15 fulltime staff however. Really not far off based on percentages.
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So, again, what are you going to do as a basic with bunker gear?

And like I told triemal, who has no interest or information about ATCEMS, and is only here because I challenged him in the past, SCBA's were issued to cadets in the fall academy. Picking apart a post and saying "refuted by" and not adding any pertinent information is what he seems to be good at. And I stated that these were opinions and facts. When we're talking about an agency that is paid for by tax dollars, including mine, I can give my damn opinions all I want. You don't need a 2 thousand dollar uniform budget for a new cadet.
 
teedubbyaw said:
So, again, what are you going to do as a basic with bunker gear?

And like I told triemal, who has no interest or information about ATCEMS, and is only here because I challenged him in the past, SCBA's were issued to cadets in the fall academy. Picking apart a post and saying "refuted by" and not adding any pertinent information is what he seems to be good at. And I stated that these were opinions and facts. When we're talking about an agency that is paid for by tax dollars, including mine, I can give my damn opinions all I want. You don't need a 2 thousand dollar uniform budget for a new cadet.
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I have already answered your question about basics with bunker gear, move on.

SCBAs were not issued in any academy. Can guarantee you that, so who ever your friend is, does not know what an SCBA is, or its not the truth. We were issued masks with container filters. There is a $60 million dollar budget, why not outfit your employees when you can? Its not like if we quit we get to keep the gear. It was an investment by the department.

Its amazing how people on this site are so opinionated about somewhere when they have never been employed. Worrying about the place YOU work seems to make more sense.
 
teedubbyaw said:
So, again, what are you going to do as a basic with bunker gear?
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Access the vehicle with my partner? Less than 20% of out district is covered by a paid fire. Sometimes it takes the volunteers a while to show up. Also I don't wish for us to get structural gear, since wildfire is more of a concern and we have a wildland fire program. We are not alone in having this, I have no idea if Texas agencies do, I would imagine. Makes for good cold weather gear as well, especially with snow drifts. That's what we want to do. What ATCEMS wishes to do may be different.
 
I had 3 friends go through that academy, but ok.

And you guys are asking for a budget increase. That's why. The expenditures are outrageous. You guys are blowing money out the *** on people who are with the company for, what, 6mo-yr? There's no investment there. Fix the other problems, including the high turn over rate, and I wouldn't really care if basics had bunker gear at the least of things. The focus has been misdirected for so long with ATCEMS.
 
Tigger said:
Access the vehicle with my partner? Less than 20% of out district is covered by a paid fire. Sometimes it takes the volunteers a while to show up. Also I don't wish for us to get structural gear, since wildfire is more of a concern and we have a wildland fire program. We are not alone in having this, I have no idea if Texas agencies do, I would imagine. Makes for good cold weather gear as well, especially with snow drifts. That's what we want to do. What ATCEMS wishes to do may be different.
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Right. Rural is different. ATCEMS is not rural. Their most rural unit is a spec ops truck that is equipped with all of that. And you know the size of Austin fire department?

And we're not talking about your agency or bunker gear, really. We're talking about money. If you were a tax payer in Travis county, you may have different opinions.
 
teedubbyaw said:
I had 3 friends go through that academy, but ok.

And you guys are asking for a budget increase. That's why. The expenditures are outrageous. You guys are blowing money out the *** on people who are with the company for, what, 6mo-yr? There's no investment there. Fix the other problems, including the high turn over rate, and I wouldn't really care if basics had bunker gear at the least of things. The focus has been misdirected for so long with ATCEMS.
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My apologies, 3 friends that don't know what an SCBA is...Don't like the ways we spend money? Join the department, become in a position of power, or join city council. Until then, your opinion and strewed facts mean nothing. Keep being you and making your department thrive which apparently has nothing wrong with it.
 
I forget how sensitive you get about ATCEMS. :rolleyes:

Every news article and publishing in the last few months about the troubles of ATCEMS speaks for itself. When a large cooperation can't get their **** together, well, I need not say anymore.
 
teedubbyaw said:
Right. Rural is different. ATCEMS is not rural. Their most rural unit is a spec ops truck that is equipped with all of that. And you know the size of Austin fire department?

And we're not talking about your agency or bunker gear, really. We're talking about money. If you were a tax payer in Travis county, you may have different opinions.
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You asked what I would do with bunker as a basic. I answered you. What else do you want?
 
teedubbyaw said:
How many extrications have you worked? Being in the way is what we're good at. If fire can't handle ABC's then I don't know what to tell you. As a medic, there may be a slim chance extrication will be so prolonged that we will have to tube them, or needle decompression. But justifying bunker gear for every bls provider in a new company is not really an argument that can be backed.
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There should be an engine company on-scene both to block (the Heavy Rescue needs to position next to the wreck), and to deploy a hoseline to protect the crew working. The Heavy Rescue crew will all be occupied with tasks, not involved in pt. care. If the engine company has four people, the fourth will be available to do pt. care inside the car. The other bucket person will staff the hoseline. The driver pumps, and the officer has incident command.

If there are less than four on the engine (many departments run with 2 or 3), someone from the EMS crew will need to get inside the car. If the ambulance gets on-scene before suppression crews, they will need to get inside the car. Pretty much EMS needs PPE.
 
MedicSansBrains said:
Austin Recently had their budget review. The chief was questioned on why the EMS staff has such a high suicide and turnover rate. He said his budget hasn't caught up to the growth of the city.

The chief requested an extra 1.6 million dollars in the budget to move the system from a 48 hour work week to a 42 hour workweek. The request was granted so it seems that is the intention moving forward.
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Suicide rate? ATCEMS employees are killing themselves? I don't understand.
 
teedubbyaw said:
Do you have an agency with 500+ employees that all get issued scba's and do you think it's a good financial decision to buy that many people personal bunker gear?

Didn't think so.
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No one clued me in to this until a few years ago, but with grants and other budget allocations, if you don't spend the money, you lose it. You and your friends may not be fully informed. Bunkers for EMS may have very well come from a grant. Same for the SCBA's or whatever they use for respiratory protection.

Where I work, we were able to fund a fourth position (a medic) on 8 of our ladder trucks due to a grant. We get new Hazmat meters and RAD pagers from grants. Every front-line unit has iPads from a grant. We're required, for three years, every Mon. and Tues. to use it for MCI training, to record each txp. We built a new fire station, but couldn't staff it for over a year because the funds were set aside several years earlier, and it needed to be used, or it would be lost forever. These are just a few examples. Some purchases may be puzzling, but it may very well be a use it or lose it scenario.
 
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