Town want to Evict our rescue squad!

BHSQUADNJ

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We have a big controversy brewing in our town. I am a member of a volunteer rescue squad which leases space in a great building owned by the town. The town has proposed " moving" our squad out of our building in order to create a new senior citizens center. THey want to house the squad with our town's fire dept. under a theory of " shared services"- I'm interested to hear from any of you who are housed in combined " homes" Does this work or are there frequent " turf wars"?
 
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MMiz

I put the M in EMTLife
Community Leader
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I can imagine that EMS want's their own station, and the FD wants their own turn too. Generally no one likes change.

As I review my lesson plans for the upcoming year, I just finished the one on the Core Democratic Values. The idea of the common good is all about compromising in the name of the good of all. Will the town be better served by having a senior citizens center? If so, then I think it may be worth combining the two services in one building.

Are there any other options? Any other buildings that you could occupy or rent at a nominal cost? I grew up on the good 'ole 80s movies where people banded together and fixed up old dumps and turned them into gems. Could your department or squad do that to a building? It would probably serve to bring the community together too.

Hope that helps. Good luck and keep us updated!
 

Wingnut

EMS Junkie
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It's really not a big deal. Most of our stations are housed with FD, a couple are next door to SO and some stand alone. I've worked at all the different housing situations and haven't noticed a bit of difference between them. Except that when I'm at a station housed with FD I have more people to talk to and one time they pranked the hell out of me since I was the new girl.

Our supervisors are currently going through a turf war too but you'd never know it even at the stations where we're housed together.
 

MedicPrincess

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My station is in the same as the FD. We all get along fine. Basically, we respect their common areas and they respect ours. When we get up of a call during the night we have to walk right by their sleeping area. We simply be as quiet as possible and cut out any of our chatter.

The FF will invite us down for dinner if they have something special and if we bring something in we share with them.

We all share the station cleaning duties. We are responsible for cleaning the upstairs, the FF do the downstairs.

That being said, the FD is IAFF. There are 2 or 3 FF that feel as though EMS should also be union and on their shift things can get pretty tense. That shift simply stays out of the FF areas.

Its all about compromise. We all have to work together, so its best to just get along.
 

JJR512

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Fire and EMS services in my county are completely integrated. All firefighters are required to be at least EMT-B certified, although this is a somewhat new requirement and not all are yet. But they know it's just a matter of time. And that's for both paid and volunteers, which are also completely integrated. Sometimes a FF will show up and ride only the fire engine...sometimes only the ambulance...sometimes some of both...The only real exception is that although firefighters are required to be EMT-Bs, EMT-Bs are not required to be firefighters. You might think this would cause some hard feelings, with firefighters crying that if they have to be cross-trained, so too should the only-EMT-Bs, but in actuality, most of the firefighters don't really want to be on the ambulance (they'd prefer to stick to the fires), so they're happy if there are people around who are willing to ride the ambulance only and won't compete for a spot on a fire call.
 

Jon

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I'e heard horror stories from folks who work FD-based EMS in "big cities" - New York, Philadelphia, Washington DC - the medics are treated as second-class citizens, even though they are the only part of the FD that makes money...

Volunteer wise, around here, many services are combined EMS and fire agencies... members run EMS, Fire, or both. Most everyone plays nice with everyone else.
 
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BHSQUADNJ

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Town Wants to Evict Our Squad !

Thanks for all replies. Our concern is one of space primarily. The town wants to move us our of a 5500 square foot building, into the Fire dept. building- and the proposal is to have us share the FD's "common room" and then give us 1500 square feet of space for our 2 Rigs, the business office, storage etc. We're also concerned about not enough space for training, particularly when the FD has the " common room"-

We also feel that as a volunteer squad, we will lose our " stand alone" identity- Its tough enough to recruit and keep good volunteers as it is- and the feeling is that if the current volunteers are unhappy, they will leave, and the next thing you know, we're looking at a paid EMS service coming to town. Any thoughts from those of you in volunteer squads???
 

Jon

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Is the FD paid or volunteer? If it is combination (a couple of paid staff "drivers" suplemented by volunteers) then perhaps the paid staff, already paid by the town, can supplement your volunteer staffing... not what you "want" to hear, but that is how EMS is moving. I, personally, feel that paid or volunteer, the ambulance needs to be STAFFED by a "duty crew" who are on station.



A local stand-alone, Combination (volly/paid) Ambulance Co moved out of their building for a year while it was renovated.

Their Buisness office re-located to a local developer's half-occupied office building for the year, rent-free.

Suggestions:
Talk with real-estate developers. If the market is "down", see if they will lease you office space at little or no cost for your buisness office / billing department.

Talk with the municipality about meeting space... If you need space for drills/meetings, they might be able to let you use a "public building" for it (Library meeting room, Town Hall, etc).

Finally - start a capital campaign and build your own building.
 

aline

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My company is a combination paid and volunteer. At our main station, we have our own building. But, four of our ambulances are housed in the stations of our local volunteer fire department. It works out well. The FF's take care of us and we take care of them. I enjoy working with them.
How well it works for your agency will, most likely, depend on the attitudes on both sides of the transition.

Take Care and Stay Safe.
 
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