Since Alan Brunacini wrote the Essentials of Fire Department Customer Service in 1996, fire and emergency services agencies have engaged in vigorous discussions about ways to add value to their service by focusing on “Mrs. Smith.” This trend echoed the emergence of a broader emphasis on performance and accountability in the public sector as a whole, which often placed customer charters and customer service expectations on par with privatization and competitive tendering for public services as ideals in the delivery of government services.

The ever-expanding needs of Mrs. Smith have driven a revolutionary repositioning of fire departments as the agencies people turn to when no one else will help. This shift started long before Brunacini gave these expectations a name. Firefighters’ desire to be of service have provided fire departments with opportunities and challenges alike. Many communities have experienced declining fire incidence and fire death rates in spite of — rather than because of — their fire departments’ lack of attention to fire prevention, yet they have not enjoyed a “peace dividend” largely because fire departments can count on increasing response demands for non-fire services to justify their budget requests.

In an attempt to restore balance to the debate about efficiency, effectiveness, economy and equity in the provision of public services, citizen-focus and civic engagement recently have replaced customer service as organizational imperatives. The difference between citizens and customers distinguishes the public service ethos from the quid pro quo motives of private enterprises. Understanding how to engage citizens rather than serve customers should then represent a core function and top priority for any public entity. Getting a grip on how people appreciate and value public services can provide public managers with insights into new or different ways of meeting community expectations, often without increasing costs.

The ways public agencies interact with and serve their citizens vary widely depending upon their operational functions and the nature of the communities they serve. In this sense, communities include not only the residents or inhabitants of the political subdivision overseeing the public service entity, but also the communities of interest that influence the public agenda.

Placing the various forms of civic engagement between a public agency and its citizens along a continuum will help illustrate how leaders can improve, expand or at least alter the interactions between their agencies and communities to improve service performance, efficiency and accountability. Such improvements offer the possibility, if not the promise, of durable, constructive and respectful relationships between citizens and public agencies.

Communication. At the most basic level, public agencies communicate with citizens. Efforts to communicate with citizens often involve little more than efforts to inform or educate people about the agency or its activities. In some cases, communication with citizens seeks to change their behavior as a means of fulfilling the public agency’s mission. As the relationship between an agency and citizens evolves, communication often becomes both an activity or output of the agency and an input into its processes. When communication from the public influences an agency’s agenda or programs, then it advances along the continuum toward consultation.

Consultation. When public agencies consult their communities, they seek information from citizens to guide them in the development of policies, the implementation of programs, or the evaluation of results. Consultation involves active listening as distinct from simple hearing. Rather than providing a forum for the expression of opinions and the venting of frustrations, effective consultation yields valuable insights into the aspirations and expectations of citizens and communities. Effective consultation can help build consensus, but failing that can still assure opponents that their concerns have been given appropriate consideration.

Cooperation. Public agencies that find themselves regularly confronting controversial issues often find it appropriate to apply the old adage, “keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” Cooperating with key stakeholders to identify problems, determine priorities, or evaluate alternative solutions helps ensure that public service remains aligned to the public agenda without turning the organization’s direction or operation over to special interests. Cooperation with key stakeholders falls short of slipping toward direct democracy, and properly understood and applied it builds the public agency’s capacity to anticipate and respond to public expectations without compromising the interests of the public officials ultimately responsible for organizational governance.

Partnership (co-production). Public agencies can’t meet every demand placed on them. And in many cases they cannot deliver what’s really required. In such instances, public agencies often find it valuable, if not imperative, to engage citizen stakeholders in the enterprise of delivering service to affected communities. In some instances, public participation augments agency capabilities by working alongside existing delivery systems. In other cases, it replaces public agency delivery systems altogether by providing a more efficient or effective means of meeting public expectations. Often, but certainly not always, the public agency retains overall authority and responsibility for policy decisions and the overall direction, but depends on partner organizations for program delivery.

Participation (collaboration). In some special circumstances, public agencies find it not only possible but desirable to enter into relationships with their citizens and communities that involve either shared decision-making or action. These processes often involve carefully crafted discourse, reasoned deliberations, and decisions taken by consensus. In a few instances, public agencies turn the decision-making process over to citizens entirely, and assume the sole role of service provider or policy implementer. The effective execution of this sort of engagement often requires public officials to display extraordinary leadership skills as facilitators rather than directors.

Few fire and emergency services agencies ever get beyond the communication stage of civic engagement. We often mistake the highly favorable opinions of citizens as an indicator that consultation on important matters is unnecessary because people trust us implicitly. As a consequence, we often marginalize the opinions of nay-sayers or opponents of public safety programs, concluding that they are a small and disaffected minority operating far outside the mainstream.

When we do engage in co-production, we often compromise its effectiveness by systematically co-opting program participants, leaving little distinction between their interests and our own. This has the effect of aligning their interests to ours, rather than vice versa, which leads us to believe that our actions are already congruent with the public interest rather than a only narrow segment of it that happens to share our perspective.

Turning the future over to others is the farthest thing from the minds of most fire and emergency services executives. Conventional wisdom seems to suggest that decisions about public safety should be kept as far away from the public as possible. Efforts to develop and impose staffing and response time standards on fire departments through NFPA 1710 and NFPA 1720 are a classic examples of an intention to undermine, if not overturn, the public will.

Getting to know Mrs. Smith has helped fire and emergency services look beyond ourselves. Now is the time for us to expand the conversation and get to know others in our communities. By engaging our communities outside the usual discourse of emergencies and customer service we can have the opportunity to gain understandings that can help us mediate conflicts between competing conceptions of what’s good and what’s right such as who pays, who benefits, how much things cost, and what kinds of alternative arrangements exist. If we truly open ourselves us to what citizens have to offer, we might discover that they know a lot more than customers do and care much more deeply about how we operate and how well we perform.

When my father and brothers were firefighters in the 1970s, I listened for calls about an injured firefighter on our scanner, hearing the chief called for the chaplain and the chief’s wife to pick up the injured firefighter’s wife.

My mom and I would freeze at each call. With three family members at a fire scene, the risk factor is higher. Thankfully, the department never lost a firefighter, and my two brothers since have retired safely.

I thought of the nature of firefighter families several times this week. I was contacted by an organization looking for someone who could give a talk about being a chief‘s wife. The woman I suggested called me later, and I explained to her that because of her many years of marriage to a prominent chief and her incredible sense of humor, she was my immediate choice for the speaking engagement.

Also, last week I saw on the Internet that two firefighters who had died in a fire allegedly were under the influence of a drugs and/or alcohol. While there was some controversy over whether that information should have been released, I was more interested in the question raised about how the firefighters’ grieving families would deal with this additional information.

And then I received an e-mail from the son of a firefighter who died in the line of duty. “Unfortunately many in our industry shrug off safety issues/measures until an incident happens, which is then too little too late,” he wrote. He was not referring to his father’s death but rather the death of a neighboring firefighter who was ejected and killed from his rig during an accident. That firefighter wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.

“It’s an awful thing to lose a firefighter in one’s department,” he wrote. “It’s even worse to be a family member of a firefighter who does not return from a call. Most in the fire service can, in time, move on; however I can tell you that for the family, it’s something that they never get over.”

Last week the Charleston (S.C.) Fire Department released Phase 1 of the report developed by the fire assessment and review task force. There are approximately 200 recommendations [www.firechief.com] and priorities for their implementation, from immediate to longer range.

How must the families of the Charleston Nine feel about the report? What about the families of other Charleston Fire Department personnel? The grief over losing the nine firefighters and the department changes their deaths have brought must be stressful for everyone, but particularly for the families.

John Milton once wrote, “They also serve who only stand and wait.” You chose your profession, but your spouse or partner chose you. Families share a special bond with the fire service, through the good and the sad.

If art imitates life, the fire service should ask itself what kind of message it is sending these days about our ethics. In a recent episode of the long-running cartoon sitcom The Simpsons, Homer and his friends become volunteer firefighters after a drug-addled Homer crashes his car into the Springfield fire station, disabling the town’s firefighters.

As Homer, Moe, Principal Skinner and Apoo begin receiving recognition, respect and rewards from their fellow Springfield citizens for their efforts, they begin to assume a sense of entitlement. When Mr. Burns, Springfield’s most prominent resident, rebuffs their requests for reward, they begin helping themselves to the spoils of war with the red devil.

As Homer’s behavior begins to spin out of control, Marge and Lisa force him to confront his demons before he loses their respect or further erodes his dignity. As his fellow volunteers scramble for booty in the next burning building they enter, it starts to collapse, literally as well as figuratively. Homer rises to the occasion, rescuing his fellow firefighters from both the fire and the consequences of their looting. All ends well with Homer recognizing that a job well-done is its own reward, regaining his self-respect and the admiration of his loving family.

Good satire always has at its core a kernel of truth. What truth then does this episode reveal about us?

Has the fire service become just another vocal, disaffected self-interest group? Are we signaling the community that we not only deserve their respect but also demand rewards for our service beyond reasonable compensation for our labor and expenses? What does our behavior say about our values? Others can only judge our ideals through our actions. What are we doing to promote ethics and sound moral reasoning among our firefighters?

I recently helped conduct interviews for the appointment of a chief fire officer in a metropolitan fire department. The candidates each were given 10 minutes to prepare a five-minute presentation on a project with which they had been involved, either as a leader or participant, that either promoted or embodied one or more of five key values: service to community, skill, integrity, adaptability and camaraderie. These presentations were, on the whole, disappointing. Ten minutes does not give you enough time to think too long or hard about what you want to say, and as such it minimizes if not eliminates the opportunity to baffle with BS when unable to dazzle with brilliance.

Values are something you feel, and what I saw suggests that we don’t feel too deeply about what we’re doing these days.

Of the four presentations, the two most consistently overlooked of the five values were integrity and service to community. Skills, adaptability and camaraderie strike me more as means than ends. Each of the presentations that emphasized these values suggested in one way or another how the things we do enhance our value to the community (in contrast to increasing the value we deliver to the community) and reinforce our sense of loyalty to one another. I couldn’t help thinking that anyone outside our organization hearing these presentations might need to be forgiven for thinking that we were only in the fire department for ourselves.

Despite my sense of disappointment, even despair, at the quality of the presentations I heard and what they might say about ethics in the fire service, I remain firmly of the view that firefighters join the service out of a sense of longing to be part of something bigger than themselves. They, like most of us, genuinely wish to be of service to others. The rewards for such service come from the tacit knowledge that they are, with our support and guidance, making the world a better place simply through their willingness to put their lives on the line for others.

Of course, we want to minimize the risks we face as well as those we expose our firefighters to. That is only rational and responsible behavior. But we should also want to know that what we do makes a difference, both for us and for those we serve. Too often these days, we seem to avoid situations where we can be assured of making a difference simply because the work that produces those results is not accompanied by the same level or risk and accompanying recognition and reward we get from fighting a big fire or making a daring rescue.

We should see serving the community as a privilege and a calling, not just a job. We should not tolerate a sense of entitlement within our ranks or promote the idea that firefighting is any more noble or necessary than the other vocations we depend upon to make our communities safe, comfortable, prosperous, enjoyable and just places to live. None of this precludes promoting a sense of pride in our profession or recognizing our accomplishments so long as we remember that we are here for others not ourselves.

Getting right with ourselves means getting right with the communities for whom we work and appreciating that their world does not and should not revolve around us. Every community has its Montgomery Burns. If we depend on their recognition as our reward we will inevitably succumb to bitterness and a sense of entitlement. As Homer learned the hard way, when we respect ourselves and place the needs of others first, we will always enjoy a far greater reward, one that can’t be taken from us.

In a recent issue of the Building Safety Journal International Code Council CEO Richard Weiland talks about the fire service’s increased participation in the building-code process. I think it‘s important to note that ICC recognizes this shift and its importance to the code industry.

“Earlier this year at the codes Forum in Rochester [New York], we saw first hand the passion and motivation of fire services members in the debate over residential sprinklers (RB114),” Weiland said. “The proposal to require fire sprinklers in one- and two- family homes and townhouses sparked a spirited discussion. Fire professionals voiced their opinion, and their opinion was heard and respected. While that opinion ultimately did not prevail, I think the day was a success for the fire services, and for ICC as a whole.”

I really think this is a respectful acknowledgement, and the fire service should follow this momentum toward greater influence in the provision of building safety.

Weiland, however, observed that the fire service has put less emphasis on loss prevention. “Too many fire departments continue to put prevention on the back burner, when in fact more lives are saved preventing fires then putting them out,” he said. I have to imagine — or would like to think — that the ICC is concerned about a waking giant.

There was really a small crowd of fire service people participating in the ICC Code Hearings, compared to what there could have been. Even though we in fact have fire and life-safety loss management as a back-burner function, the fire service could easily double or triple the numbers seen in Rochester. In fact, there were a number of fire service people who were in Rochester whose bosses directed them to not vote due to the tremendous political ramifications and controversy over residential sprinklers in their jurisdictions.

But it is ongoing, up-front participation in the code process that is important. The vote in Rochester was to overturn the International Residential Code Committee’s decision to not move sprinklers from the appendix to the code body. As usual the fire service was reacting to a challenge. It really is more effective to be involved on the front end through participation instead of trying to overturn a status quo action that requires a two-thirds majority. Firefighter safety in part depends on enforcement, engineering, education and all other means of thoughtful planning.

The fire service is represented on the ICC Board by two veterans: Vice President Adolph Zubia, fire chief in Las Cruces, N.M., and Barbara Koffron, fire marshal in Phoenix. These individuals represent the fire service’s interests well, but we need more participation.

As I previously wrote, fire chiefs should be joining the ICC as members, participating on ICC committees, and forming better productive and supportive relationships with their local building officials. These actions even meet the spirit of the 16 Firefighter Life-Safety Initiatives. Number 15 says “advocacy must be strengthened for the enforcement of codes and the installation of home fire sprinklers.” These efforts are inexpensive and easy for every chief to do can some day save a firefighter‘s life.

Some fire departments have submitted applications annually to the Assistance to Firefighters Grant program without success, while other departments have received numerous grants. This is creating frustration.

I realize the FIRE Grants are a touchy subject, especially because the funds are fought for every year. Still, early this year I wrote to one of the leaders at the U.S. Fire Administration and asked if it might be beneficial to limit how frequently a fire department could receive a FIRE Grant — for example, if a department receives a FIRE Grant one year, then it would have to wait one year before it could apply again. This would help spread the money a little further.

The reply was that it would be difficult to monitor who received grants and when they received them. Perhaps this was their way of saying don‘t question the FIRE Grant money or it might disappear.

Recently I visited the DHS’s FIRE Grant Web site, in particular to look at the Fire Prevention & Safety Grant program, which is the smallest portion of the FIRE Grant program.

On the Web site, the 2004 Fire Prevention & Safety Grants weren’t broken out separately, but of the 534 grants awarded that year, only 15 of the grants were for more than $600,000. In 2005, the FP&S Grants were listed separately and of the more than 300 grants, 18 were awarded for more than $650,000. In 2006, of the 230 grants, 22 awarded for more than $750,000.

In 2004, no Fire Prevention & Safety Grant exceeded $750,000. In 2005, four were for $1 million and in 2006 six were for $1 million.

The state of Indiana was awarded $5.8 million in FP&S grants between 2004 and 2006. These grants were awarded to three organizations: Indiana University for Fire Prevention (each of the three years, totaling $2.7 million), the Trustees of Indiana University for Research ($1 million), and the People‘s Burn Foundation of Indiana Inc. ($2.1 million).

The International Association of Fire Fighters and the IAFF Burn Foundation received three consecutive annual awards each, totaling nearly $5 million. The National Fire Protection Association has received awards totaling $4.7 million. The International Association of Fire Chiefs ($2.7 million), the National Volunteer Fire Council ($2.6 million) and the Home Safety Council ($2.6 million) also rank high among organizations receiving top dollars.

And scattered among these high dollar figures were $8,100 for the Scott (La.) Volunteer Fire Department, $7,978 for the Lincoln (Mass.) Fire Department, and a meager $639 for North Bay Firefighters and Community Education program in Niceville, Fla.

Fire prevention and safety education traditionally have been the last fire department functions to receive funding. The FIRE Grants have helped change that, and the focus on fire prevention in communities, safety for firefighters and emergency workers, and much-needed research the grants have allowed should have an impact. The frequency of some of the grant awards must mean that progress is being made.

Still, this year’s firefighter fatalities are estimated to exceed last year’s numbers, and there are more multiple-fatality fires this year than last.

What more can we do? Or is money the only answer?

The great Chicago architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe once quipped, “less is more.” His pioneering vision stripped buildings down to their bare essentials and restored a sense of human scale and purpose to the urban form.

The fire service could learn a lot from modernist architects. Rather than turning their backs on their profession, Mies, Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius deconstructed and renewed architecture by focusing on its essential purpose: making buildings work for people. How could we make the fire service work better for our communities?

In recent years, fire agencies around the developed world have pursued a modernization agenda that has seen an unprecedented expansion of the services they offer the public. But do people really need these services or do they use them because they have already paid for them?

Look closely at who pays and who benefits when fire agencies deliver these services. Until recently, the provision of fire and rescue services was widely, if not universally, considered a public good. Public goods have two distinctive characteristics: anyone can use them and the use by one individual does not diminish the amount available for someone else to consume. For the most part, fire service meets the first part of this test. But as the consumption of these services rises because of free access and diversification of service offerings, the quality and the quantity of service available to others has come under increasing pressure.

The fire service has argued vigorously that the supply of services should expand to meet rising demands as a way of preserving the public good character of the service. But these arguments are tainted by the fact that in most cases calls for such expansion benefit those delivering the service more than those consuming the service by creating more jobs and pushing managerial pay scales higher.

One way of managing demands involves charging fees for certain services. This simple act transforms the service provided for a fee into a private good rather than a public good; the value extracted from the consumption is related directly to both the consumer’s ability and willingness to pay. Inability to pay excludes people who might need the service from enjoying its consumption or requires others to cross-sibsidize their consumption when efforts to collect the fee fail. Willingness to pay encourages rivalry as competing conceptions of the value derived from the service by the consumer drive demand for its consumption at various price points. Cost recovery or fees for attendance at false alarms are a good case in point. Many building owners would rather pay for fire service attendance at false alarm rather than upgrade their fire alarm systems.

Fire and rescue services have historically avoided fees for service because they marginalize or exclude the most vulnerable in society from consuming the services. When this happens, others in the community can suffer undesirable consequences even if they could otherwise afford to pay and would be willing to do so to avoid the harm caused by another’s failure to consume the service when it was truly needed, especially when doing so sooner rather than later would reduce the costs and consequences for all concerned. Economists refer to this situation as a negative externality.

Many fire and emergency services recognize externalities can be either negative or positive. As such, many enabling statutes specifically preclude charges for services that benefit others besides those who deliver and consume them, like fire prevention services. Oddly, some fire departments take exactly the opposite stance, charging for fire prevention activities such as plan review and inspection services because they relate to specific projects and require permits or regulatory consent and involve profit-motive transactions among the other participants.

In the absence of simple and accessible ways of reducing the costs of maintaining fire service as a public good, many fire and emergency services have sought to extract greater value from each unit of investment and production as a means of increasing efficiency.

Innovators recognize four primary pathways for improving products and services:

1. Change the product or service;




2. Add accessories;




3. Add complementary products or services; and




4. Enhance the product or service delivery channel.

The fire service has pursued the last three of these pathways with vigor. But have we ever really established though whether the services we provide are the right ones for our communities? A close look at the situation reveals significant inconsistencies in our own expectations, not just those of the communities we serve.

Instead of seeking additional fire sprinkler requirements as an alternative form of fire service delivery or granting financial incentives for the installation of protection beyond minimum building code requirements, many communities and fire service advocates are seeking both higher building standards and the adoption of minimum staffing and response time requirements in their communities. If firefighters believe, as they suggest, that sprinklers will mean smaller, less threatening fires, then why would fire departments need to maintain high staffing and low response-time standards when more buildings are better protected? The answer lies in the large proportion of existing buildings that will require protection despite our best efforts to raise the bar for others.

How then can we improve protection and lower the costs of providing fire safety for our communities. We can start by considering how economic incentives influence the choices people in our communities make. If we continue to increase the range and scope of services we provide as a means of increasing productivity then the internal efficiencies we achieve may come at the cost of community welfare when demand for these “free” services outstrips our ability to meet community expectations. Doing fewer things better as a means of improving the economic efficiency of our agencies may require us to consider ways of encouraging greater consumption of preventive services and those activities that promote positive externalities.

Less can be more if rediscover the essential truth about fire services: people are prepared to protect what they value. We can restore a human scale to our service and make fire and rescue services work for people even before they find themselves in strife. Doing this will require us to tailor our service to the community’s preference for prevention rather than cure. Making such changes will ensure that benefits accrue to both those who pay and those who consume our services.

Get a group of firefighters together in any setting and ask them what they like about being a firefighter. It won’t be long before someone talks about the “fellowship.” They may use other terms — camaraderie, friendship, bonds — but firefighters feel that they are part of a unique group. Volunteers and career firefighters alike espouse it. I‘d like to share a story about a firefighter who does more than talk about it — he lives it.

Dave Palumbo retired from Chesterfield Fire & EMS as a battalion chief on Jan. 1, 2001. But anyone who knows Dave knows that he really didn‘t retire, he “re-fired.” He took his passion for people and service to others in some new directions while maintaining strong ties with the department. For example, he serves as a volunteer driver for the local chapter of the American Red Cross. Several days each week you can see Dave checking out one of the ARC vehicles (we let the ARC park their vehicles at the public safety training center) to make his rounds, taking senior citizens back and forth to their medical appointments.

Dave may have retired from CFEMS almost seven years ago, but he never turned in his membership card. You can be sure that he has every special CFEMS event on his calendar, from recruit-school graduations to retiree receptions. More importantly, he‘s always there.

What is really special about Dave, however, is that he is actively present. Recently, the Old Dominion Professional Firefighters Burn Foundation held its annual golf tournament to raise funds for the Evans-Haynes Burn Center at Virginia Commonwealth University, Medical College of Virginia. It was an unseasonably hot day, yet Dave was one of the first-arriving workers, showing up with his own pickup truck loaded with ice for the event. He stayed for the rest of the day, which lasted well after dark, filling coolers with ice and refreshments, delivering more ice to the coolers on the course, moving people around the course, and doing whatever else needed to be done. He was actively present.

Shortly after he retired, Dave found his real cause: construction of a memorial wall to honor CFEMS members who‘d lost their lives in the service of others. Dave has been a champion of this cause in the greatest sense of the word, developing the idea, working with the architect on the design, raising the several hundred thousand dollars for the wall‘s construction (no county funds are involved in the project), finding the contractors to do the work, and more. With the assistance of a handful of other committed souls, the construction of the wall — and the realization of Dave‘s vision — is well under way on the grounds of Chesterfield County‘s Eanes-Pittman Public Safety Training Center.

We frequently talk about the significance of role models in our profession and the influence they have on the development of young employees or members; those discussions are often in the context of professional or technical-skills development. But Dave Palumbo is a great role model for what fellowship really means within the American fire service.

Last week while I was at FAMA/FEMSA meetings in Monterey, Calif., I saw two fire trucks stopped at a traffic light. I couldn‘t see if the driver of the old tiller truck was wearing a seatbelt, so I asked him if he was. He replied that the old truck didn‘t have a shoulder strap, but that he was wearing the lap belt. The second apparatus was a newer model, however, and I didn‘t see a shoulder strap on that navy-shirted driver either.

I saw Monterey Safety Officer/Div. Chief Stewart Roth at the FEMSA banquet later that evening. I told him about what I saw, and he took down the details and said he‘d get back to me.

The second firefighter’s name, I found out when Roth called me this week, is Jared Neal and he has been with the department for a year-and-a-half. “When I asked the captains, they told me that he is the most safety-conscious guy we have,” Roth said.

Roth asked Neal about the situation, and the spirited Neal replied, “Chief, the question should be why was I wearing the seatbelt so awesomely!” It turns out that Neal was wearing his seatbelt after all.

Maybe this young firefighter has it right. It might be more effective to compliment firefighters — and officers — for wearing their seatbelts “awesomely” than to reprimand them for not wearing the belts.

As a safety officer, Roth is unusual. He‘s enthusiastic, straightforward and, well, entertaining. When he spoke to the FAMA/FEMSA attendees, he held everyone‘s attention.

“Our firefighters have less injuries today because of the improvements in safety gear,” he told attendees. “Our world has changed. What you provide us today is for a war zone…. I think there will come a time that firefighters will look like astronauts. You are manufacturing equipment for today‘s firefighters. These kids can manipulate equipment, and your job is to keep up with that. You have made us more efficient with more reliable apparatus, equipment and training. We need to teach firefighters what to do with the equipment and how to use it.”

I asked Roth how is it that this young firefighter is so safety conscious, and while he didn‘t have a definitive answer, he says that captains use good leadership and that recruits learn early that safety is non-negotiable. “In the academy, they know they can‘t move until they belt the seatbelts…. I tell them, ‘asking me to overlook your safety is to overlook any value on your life. Don‘t count on it.’”

I spoke with Roth in the same week that the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation’s held its annual memorial weekend, and it was refreshing to hear from one safety officer who has a clear message.

Over the past five years, my department has been awarded several grants from both the Assistance to Firefighters Grant program and private foundations. These grants have helped provide much-needed equipment and training. Recently, I closed out one of our grants and help a neighboring department gather the paperwork to do the same. In doing so, I met several great people who are employed directly by or as contractors with FEMA who don’t just oversee the grants, but who also assist departments struggling with grants, especially the closeout reports.

The most interesting thing that I learned from Lori Smith-Lonbom, our regional fire program specialist, was that the AFG program is constantly looking to document success stories. These success stories help illustrate and reinforce the value of the program and how it has made a difference in the fire service’s ability to handle both routine and extraordinary emergencies.

For example, prior to receiving our communications grant, my department had only a small standalone dispatch center that was run by the police and had radio equipment and consoles that dated back to the early 1970s. The system virtually isolated us from our neighbors, and the radio equipment was subject to storm interference, power failures and equipment malfunctions. If our department needed help or was needed for a mutual aid, the dispatch center had to be notified over the telephone and given the necessary information. Then dispatch would notify the appropriate Wyoming units. In some cases it took more than three minutes for the tones to drop for assistance. Because of this built-in delay, few communities regularly called on us for help.

Part of our grant funds provided new communications equipment that allowed us to become a part of the county dispatch center and a CAD system that placed us on automatic aid to five surrounding communities and direct mutual aid via the extra-alarm cards to other departments in our region. The CAD system simply activates the tones of the closest stations, which are dispatched simultaneously.

I know there are departments where a thermal-imaging camera purchased through the AFG has helped save a life, and there are countless other stories where equipment or training has made a significant difference at an emergency. These are the kind of stories we need to document. Post your story or contact your FEMA regional fire program specialist for further help. This is the least we can do for all the good these grants have done for us and our communities.

Wow! We are still talking about and mourning the nine firefighters killed in a South Carolina building collapse. There is truly nothing new under the sun.

Here’s what we already knew from 200 years of firefighters dying unnecessarily in America:

• Certain construction is prone to earlier collapse.




• Truss roofs kill.




• Fire load contributes to failing structural members.

After approximately 20 minutes, if firefighters haven’t darkened the fire down significantly, officers should consider pulling all personnel out from the interior of the building and have them fight the fire defensively from outside the collapse zone. If your assessment at the 20-minute mark indicates a high probability that the structural integrity will remain, then continue with firefighting operations, as required. There are certain construction types should have officers thinking, “we are going to wash this one down the street in six hours, but we should still be committed to taking everyone of our firefighters home at the end of this thing.”

Remember that the term for fuel (the structure) in the fire tetrahedron is “reducing agent.” If structural members are being reduced (consumed), why are we surprised when the building falls down? The media and really poor fire officers always say tragedies were “without warning.” We’ve been warned for the past 200 years, only some of us aren’t listening.

A primary search in an unsprinklered, high-piled rack storage furniture store can’t last an hour in any community on the planet. I fear that an entire system of fire response was asleep at the switch!

I will refuse to add the words “brave” or “hero” to the nine killed in Charleston. They were innocent victims. This was fratricide — brother killing brother — in another death by friendly fire. When are we going to stop the madness and senselessness of these preventable deaths? This is a public health emergency. The occupational death of one worker every three days is unacceptable in every profession but ours. The rest of the world gets it. They value their firefighters and any firefighter death is a national tragedy.

We just yawn and call them “brave heros.” Then we add insult to injury by putting stick-on letters on the back window of pick-up trucks in commemoration. Where is the outrage from the fire service? I know. Let’s add a bullet to next year’s safety standdown. That ought to help.