21st Century Manifesto
The first decade of the 21st century has seen no meaningful changes to the fire service culture’s tolerance of fire deaths, injuries and property loss. Yes, I said “tolerance.”
American has known it’s had a fire problem since at least 1948, when President Harry S. Truman received the Report of the Continuing Committee of the President’s Conference on Fire Prevention and Education. Our 33rd president responded to the report by stating:
“The serious losses in life and property resulting annually from fires cause me deep concern. I am sure that such unnecessary waste can be reduced. The substantial progress made in the science of fire prevention and fire protection in this country during the past forty years convinces me that the means are available for limiting this unnecessary destruction.”
The authors of that report, along with the participants at the five Wingspread symposiums since — Wingspread Conference on Fire Service Administration, Education and Research (1966), Wingspread II (1976), III (1986), IV (1996), and V (2003) — have all said the same thing when it comes to addressing the fire problem in America:
“Fire prevention and accident prevention employ same technique. – Over the years, the approaches to the accident problem have been popularly designated as the Three E’s of Safety – Engineering, Enforcement, and Education. These ‘Three E’s’ are equally applicable to fire prevention and protection.”
So, where are we today? According to the U.S. Fire Administration, an average of 3,695 people suffered fire-related deaths in the United States between 1998 and 2007. (Those numbers do not include those who lost their lives on 9/11.) In a decade we lost the population of a small city —36,950. And thousands more suffer fire-related injuries and the property losses reach into the billions of dollars.
If we’re serious in our profession about ridding the United States of this “epidemic of fire,” I propose the following manifesto for every community in the United States.
Engineering:
- Require residential sprinklers in all newly constructed one-and two-family homes. Period.
- Change building codes so that all building materials must pass fire resistance performance standards, not just “gravity-defiance” standards.
- Change building codes in the wildland-urban interface to prohibit the use of combustible building materials. Mandate the use of block, concrete, stucco and other non-combustible materials.
- Mandate fire-safe cigarettes.
Education:
- Require that all residential property in a locality — rental and occupant-owned — has a copy of the locality’s fire-prevention code do’s and don’ts, written in plain English and other applicable languages for the community.
- Require fire departments and school systems to jointly deliver a standard fire prevention curriculum in elementary, middle, and high schools every two years.
- Require completion of fire prevention course of study as prerequisite for obtaining a residential lease or buying a home.
- Require insurance companies to inspect rental and occupant-owned residential properties before insuring the property. Require policy-holders to submit an affidavit to their insurance company stating that they comply with the fire prevention provisions of their policy and their locality every year as a condition to renew their coverage.
Enforcement:
- Investigate all fires and issue a court summons to the building occupant if a fire is determined to have been caused by their negligence. (Just like a traffic accident: if you’re at fault, you pay the price.)
- Bill the occupant for the cost of fire suppression services when a fire is determined to have been the result of occupant negligence.
- Fine builders and contractors when a fire investigation reveals that improper building materials or building practices (a) started the fire or (b) contributed to the spread of the fire.
- Fine rental-property owners who do not maintain their rental properties and whose properties are not in compliance with the locality’s fire prevention code.
- Incorporate a locality’s level of fire protection and history of fire loss into the financial processes that financial institutions use to determine a locality’s bond rating.
Sound rather harsh? Sound unrealistic? Consider for a moment what has happened since 9/11 to fight the “war on terror” — creation of DHS and TSA, hundreds of billions of dollars spent, laws adopted and changed, new training, new equipment, new ways to do our jobs. With all that and more, we’ve not suffered a single terrorist-related death or injury on United States soil since that day. We have, however, lost a “city” of 29,560 people in that same period. What are we waiting for?
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Related Topics: Robert Avsec, Public Education, Management & Administration, Leadership
May 21st, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Great job Robert. You are absolutely right.
Public education is of utmost importance, and we must start with ourselves first. We in the fire service need to be well versed on effective fire prevention measures and come to believe that prevention is everyone’s job and not a threat to suppression. A true firefighter is dedicated to protecting the community and his/her brothers and sisters from the menace of fire, and chooses the best tactics to win the fight every time. When the fire is burning, he does his job, and does it well. He also works diligently to prevent fires from endangering lives, supporting fire prevention codes and training the public, officials, and his peers in fire prevention tactics so they can join the fight against the devastating impacts of fire on our communities.
The well-known 1973 America Burning Report aimed at educating our public and our decision-makers and explained their goal as “We have become accustomed to public indifference to the fire problem. But we hold the hope that this attitude can be changed. It is our wish that this report will provide a turning point, by reaching - if only indirectly the conscience of millions of Americans.”
But then societal change does not come easy, and it is long term effort. Time, and even more importantly, systematic, sustained educational effort is needed to bring about the cultural change. And of course that means resources and funding, lack of which contributed to our failure in accomplishing the goals laid out in the 1973 America Burning Report.
Fourteen years later, the 1987 the America Burning Revisited report stated “Failing to convince elected officials of the seriousness of the fire death, injury and loss statistics was considered the most serious problem because it is the path to resolving many other problems.”
Then thirteen years later, back in 2000, the America Burning Recommissioned Report stated “The lack of substantial funding to implement America Burning speaks volumes about the low priority that all segments of government – federal, state and local – assign the fire hazard compared to other areas of public safety.”
Think about it. There must be some strong merits to this idea of educating our public and our elected officials, and increasing our advocacy at all levels of government. Otherwise it wouldn’t have been repeated time after time for the past few decades in all these reports prepared by the fire service leaders of the past, would it?
I guess it must be easier said than done, considering that after decades, we still have not conquered that “indifference” in the public and the elected officials are still not “convinced” about the seriousness of fire problem.
And if ask yourself why, you might come to the same conclusion as I; that the problem is that other than an exceptional few, most of us, don’t really believe in the solutions ourselves. Or even if we do, we are not truly committed to it.
In the book The Leadership Challenge, it is stated “There’s absolutely no way that you can convince others, over the long term, to share a dream if you’re not convinced of it yourself. You must be sincere in your own belief.” Are we? Simply stated, most of us don’t “walk the talk”, as we should.
Robert my friend keep on writing about this, not only to educate the fire service, but also to keep us accountable for walking the talk. After all, we owe it to the people that we are sworn to protect. Thanks. Oz
May 21st, 2009 at 5:04 pm
That is some fantastic work Bob, this is the Manifesto that will keep the ball rolling to change the hearts and minds.
And it’s not harsh, it’s reality.
Keep it up Bob.
RD
May 29th, 2009 at 7:44 am
Right on Bob! Well said! Your comments are reality!
June 1st, 2009 at 11:35 am
Robert,
Excellent perspective and statements!
Great work.
Christopher J. Naum, SFPE
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