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Found this application for iPhone users that others might find useful. Paramedic Protocol Advisor Cheers! P.s. Sorry I put it in the wrong section by accident. Can someone please move it to a more appropriate section? Thanks.

1) So...why are you laughing? 2) After 2 and a half years, why not let this string stay played out?

Excellent post Vent! Glad to have you back!

It seems some are viewing this situation as just "one truck" when in reality it is several trucks from several stations. In a small city with 4 stations and an average of 2 - 4 trucks per station (average 24 FFs) each making at average of 2 - 4 trips to the grocery stores each day plus coffee runs, this can add up. In larger cities you may have 20 - 40 stations. The city miles/gallon for an engine is about 3 - 5 mpg while a ladder may average 2 mpg. You don't have to go far in a city to burn up 5 gallons of fuel easily. Granted the bigger cities may have a larger budget but fuel cost is still a considerable amount and FDs, especially those that do EMS, may even exceed that of the PD. This has been the topic of many FDs and some are limiting unnecessary trips and some are rethinking how they respond to each scene by cutting the number vehicles to each alarm, both Fire and EMS. Also, some FDs would rather cut back on the community service activities that do benefit the public rather than tell their FFs they can not make several trips to Starbucks or shop all over town for each meal. Surely some here have noticed their own fuel expenditures in this economy especially when it comes to short city errand trips and that is with your POV averaging 20 mpg. Planning a meal for each shift or even the week of 2 - 3 shifts should be no different than what a family does with both parents working FT jobs and seeing the kids are taken care of. There should be enough down time at a fire station to work up a simple menu to either limit the trips or buy the food the night before or in the morning. This can be done for each individual or for the group. Millions of people in all industries work long hours and probably get a lot less sleep then many FFs. Doing 12 and 16 hour shifts at any job(s) for several consectitive days allows much less time for someone to plan for each meal and shop than a FF who works 2 - 24 hour shifts 2 - 3 days apart. Yet, other workers are able to get their meals and all it takes is a little planning and knowing it is a necessity for them to assume this responsibility on their own dime and time. It is also the stations with very few calls that worry the most about shopping. The busy ones do plan ahead because they may know trips to the grocery would be a luxury. They are rarely in their station long enough to play house. It is also the busy ones that may understand a fuel budget and the importance of keeping a certain amount of vehicles available at all times. Regardless of what company you work for, one should take the time to know what it costs to run a business and especially one that is commonly seen in public begging for tax dollars and public support. Abuse the privileges or bash the concerned taxpayers and it may be harder to convince the public they need to pay more property taxes especially when support is needed at election time for certain amendments.

Honestly normally there is more than enough food brought to the station and the odd man could just chip in some money to who ever had bought the food. And where I am at you are never short a man as you have to have someone come in if someone calls in sick or leaves hurt so they can chip in. And if you are allowed to be short a man you would only be adding at most a dollar to each remaining persons share of costs unless you are eating like kings. Also why not keep some basic supplies like soup, oatmeal, etc in your locker or car. Then you could eat. You don't have to eat fancy. I am also aware of many fire depts that have multiple sets of kitchen cabinets and multiple refrigerators so each shift has there supplies locked up. So usually they only need to bring a couple of items to make a meal and if they don't get to go shopping they can make something from what they have already. Might not be steak and shrimp but its food. Another thing am I the only person that has actually stayed at my own home for a 24 hour time period w/o leaving? Many of you are whining about them going crazy from being stuck at the station with the TV, the comp, the exercise equipment, the video games either provided or brought from home, etc. What the heck? They have more readily available to do than most tax payers do.

Ashes, not sure where you are located, but this could have been solved by your dispatch centre using the ANI-ALI system (I can't remember what that stands for, but I am sure someone will remind me)... what that does, is any call that comes into dispatch shows up on the screen of the dispatcher's computer. The phone number, address, and name of the person whose number it is shows up, if it is a land line. If it is a cell phone, the phone number and the carrier (Telus, Bell, Rogers, etc) shows up, and the tower location they are bouncing off of. At least if that cell phone caller doesn't know where they are, it is a starting point. There is nothing more you could do in the situation you had. You used all the resources you could. If your dispatch uses this, the call you described should have never happened. The dispatcher would have been able to tell if it was a cell phone or not, and they would have had access to the number called through the entire incident, as it would have stayed on their screen. If it was a land line, the exact address would have shown up too, and they could have referred back to it. This gives no chance of human error by copying down a wrong address or phone number, or the caller giving completely wrong information that is unable to be verified. Now, having said that, there are so many other ways that dispatch can mishandle a call - paging out the wrong crew is a big one. I have had many calls where I have argued with dispatch that the call is not in my area, and they have argued with me. Since I have worked in the dispatch centre here, I tend to tell them to turn around, pull the big wall map down from the ceiling, and look at a certain area, which I describe to them... within a few seconds, I get the "your unit can stand down, and we will page unit XYZ." One of the biggest problems our dispatch centre has is staff turnover - they have almost a 50% staff turnover every 3 months... this has been going on for at least 5 years, and the powers that be haven't done a thing about it. Obviously, with that kind of staff turnover, there are administrative issues. Having worked there, I can tell you what they are, but that would take a whole other thread. With that kind of turnover, and shortened orientation times, staff do not know the region, they do not know how to read maps, and they end up on a desk before they are ready. Add to that the politics that goes on in that department, and it is a recipe for disaster. The provincial dispatch centre is going to have a number of wrinkles to iron out, but that does happen with any change. I am hoping that it will be better than what I have in my area right now... because my head is starting to bleed from banging it against the wall...

I know you're already getting bashed from just about everyone, but your last sentence needed a response. YES it's an evil thing to take our jobs because we do have jobs and a job to do! No one is taking FD jobs, they simply don't have enough of a job to do. No work=no job. We have jobs without taking them from fire and we've been doing a damn good job for a long time. Now that there's less of a need for fire, you see us not being willing to give up our jobs for you as TAKING YOUR JOBS?!?!?!?!?

Psst- you aren't talking to civilians or some clueless politicians here-many of us DO work in this business. You sound like a PSA bought and paid for by the IAFF. As a matter of fact, I believe that video you linked has been used by the IAFF, but I digress. Listen, I know about the push for manning- nothing new. I also know that in many areas, unless there is a life safety issue, aggressive interior attacks are a thing of the past. Things like master streams and aerial pipes are used now more than ever before- surround and drown. You are absolutely correct about when you need a firefighter, you want 50 guys to show up in less than a minute, with state of the art equipment, have a positive water supply, no frozen hydrants, no lead out problems, all having 20 years experience, hundreds of fires under their belts, and all possessing every certification known to man- from Haz Mat to swift water rescue. Now back to real life... The fire service is used to being the sacred cow- and for good reason. Problem is, times have changed, fires ARE way down, and the fire service has adapted to that by absorbing EMS. Smart for them, not necessarily what's best for the public. The fire service- and IAFF's- number one priority has always been, and will always be fire suppression and rescue. For many areas, 3-4 man companies have always been the norm, and mutual aid agreements supplement their manpower. Ideal- no, but it's reality. In today's economy, an area's police service, EMS, and a dozen other services would suffer if fire received everything they asked for. IAFF is suffering from the same thing that killed Detroit- union arrogance. When times are great, unions negotiate incredible pay and benefits packages. If anyone knows about some of the famous(and often times ridiculous) perks the UAW managed to get for it's members, you know what I mean. Even when a company is losing money, they are required to pay their members. That's fine and great for a member, but a union also needs to be realistic about it's demands and expectations. Unions like the UAW finally agreed to concessions, but it essentially was too little, too late. Big auto needed to be bailed out- their legacy obligations were killing them. I know you cannot put a price tag on public safety, but the sad reality is that it's necessary. I believe in premium pay for risking your life, responding to incidents when everyone else is running away- that's what we do and we should be well compensated for it. Sadly, too many of us are not- especially those in EMS, and just because fire has a longer history, more members, and a stronger lobbying arm, it does not mean it has the right to walk over EMS- especially when it's not providing a better option.

In the link you provided, the entire 9 minute and 22 second video relates specifically to fire suppression, and the need for 4 people on the truck, not 3. All discussion of duties is fire suppression related. Not one single word was related to EMS operations. Not one single EMS vehicle or person was shown or interviewed. Watching the video, I cringed – I know a bit about structure fire tactics, as my husband is deputy fire chief in my area, and my father in law was fire chief in his city for many years, and had over 35 years experience before retiring. On a fire scene, having one person on a roof, or one person on an attack, or one person doing an interior search, is just plain STUPID. That is completely unnecessary risk of life and limb. THAT is the argument that was used in the video – that having 4 members would provide better care to community, and better safety to crews. I am OK with that approach. The point that you have chosen to completely ignore, is that fire departments, specifically the LVFD, are not staffing their services appropriately, and in order to staff them appropriately, are stealing from EMS. Even from your video – the question that was never asked, nor answered, was WHY Fairfax County was only staffing with 3 members.. was the reason financial? I bet it was! So, the problem is then, justifying the increased crew, and increased cost, which is a huge POLITICAL issue. Politicians and administrators don’t look at staffing as people – they are just looking at the bottom line. They don’t look at calls as real people involved – just the repurcussions if things go wrong and how it makes them look bad. The original point of this thread is that the Las Vegas FD is STEALING from EMS to justify its staffing levels and budget, rather than justify their staffing with a common sense approach and educating the public. Why are they doing this? My guess is because they can’t justify their current budget and their current toys, and now that they are in a tough financial position, they are looking for a bandaid solution (pun intended). Fire should be made to stand on its own, and justify its expenditures, exactly as EMS does, not use EMS revenues to subsidize fire. Again, refer to the restaurant analogy I used in my previous post.

I respect many of your posts and believe that you are too intelligent to make this arguement, though it doesn't surprise me totally because a fireman's ability to justify bullshit often seem endless. I think it comes from believing all the crap you see on TV and newspapers... Of course we want them cut back to reflect call volume! I don't want my city to employ 3 times as many meter readers as necessary either, but that doesn't mean that I hate meter readers. And if they have too many meter readers and the public suddenly discovers this, I don't want them to take aware a fireman's job and give it to them so that they can look productive. One chose to be a meter reader and ended up in an untenable position, the other chose to be a fireman. Once should not suffer because the other chose poorly. But according to your logic, your job should then be taken because a meter reader is certainly a more important position than the average fireman...so fuck em. Right? Correct. And here again you're hoping we'll take this line of bullshit as fact, because you're used to the public doing so. If fire takes EMS jobs to shore up their own positions that is evil. Why? Because they are not required to compete fairly. And you really need to stop using corporate take over analogies as long as the fire service is playing with public money, money that they didn't have to prove that they deserved by creating a profit. If your profession has proved that it can't survive without diversity, that's awesome. But let's quite pretending that they are involved in "corporate America" when they are using my money to screw my neighbors. You can justify it because in this case rape is good for you. Awesome. But at least have the balls to approach the problem honestly, quit with the bullshit analogies, call a spade a spade, as the saying goes. I can't imagine how disappointing it must be to have worked so hard to to compete for a coveted position that allows you money, good retirement, work time leisure, unearned hero status, only to find out that you must now justify stealing from your neighbor to keep it...I hope I never know. I hope I always have more honor than that. And if sharking jobs at any cost is ok, then can you explain the IAFFs attitude in the article below, and the gazillion other's like it? http://www.dearbornf...per%20Woods.pdf Dwayne Edited for grammar correction. No contextual changes made.

It's not about the money. 1.6 million is a drop in the bucket for North Las Vegas, so this is certainly about politics and future financial maneuvering. It irritated me when he said something to the effect, "We just want to be able to get paid for what we already do..." C'mon, the reason fire started responding to all of the calls where they are seldom necessary is so that they could shore up their call numbers and get all of their fancy equipment...You're already seeing the benefit of "doing what you do" in your budget brother... It's a crazy world. I've come to be interested in the argument but have very little hope that there will ever be enough intelligent public debate to prevent Fire from playing these types of games. They have the tradition, the budget, and the media machine to keep the voting public in the dark. They will still be bullshitting my grandkids' grandkids long after I'm gone. God bless our brothers and sisters in the Fire services, but you chose wrong. You've chosen a career that is becoming in large part obsolete and can't survive without raping someone else. When you watch your unions take jobs from those that chose differently I hope that you can see that it's not because you deserve them, but because you picked the bigger bully. When you take their jobs, you haven't competed, you haven't proved that you are professionally superior, you've simply proved that you're willing to sneak in and snatch their wallet while your union is beating their head on the sidewalk. The stories that come from the fire services seem too often to be the same stories coming from the welfare population, they seem so often to be stories of entitlement. "I got this job, and that wasn't easy, so now you have to pay me forever whether you need me or not!!" For some reason firemen seem to actually believe that a fireman unemployed is just so much more tragic then a 'normal' person being unemployed... It's a crazy world.... Dwayne

Although there are going to be a lot of glitches when the province completely takes over dispatch, the incident quoted above happens in dispatch centres across the province already, even without the regionalization. In the years I have been working rural (which is *ahem* a long time, because I am old... ) I have responded to more calls than I can count, where dispatch f***ed up directions, locations, and even what the chief complaint is. It has less to do with provincialization, and more to do wsith inadequate training of dispatchers. Patient care has been compromised in many many situations, not due to EMS, but due to dispatch. Too many dispatch centres do not appropriately educate their staff in learning the region that they cover, legal land locations, major landmarks, or even the distances to hospitals from specific areas. Given that the dispatch centre that covers where I work is an organization of complete incompetence, I am almost afraid to admit that I am looking forward to regionalization of dispatch, because it can't be worse than what we have now.

Probably. I'm a metrocare/transcare person myself. So I got my chance to work 9-1-1 after 6 months of transport bullsh!t and started 9-1-1 as a medic before my cards arrived in the mail!

all i can say is i lmao!!

Owned on an anonymous internet forum. I'll go sob softly into my pillow tonight. Have fun in your messed up system while I go back to work in a couple of days and have a blast doing it, while also living comfortably. Just to put things in perspective. Remember who has a safe, well entrenched, enjoyable position and who's obviously frustrated. Go ahead, break my balls some more.