PTC gets grant for 6 new firefighters

Mon, 08/17/2009 - 6:26am
By: John Munford

Cuts in fire equipment, supplies proposed to meet first year grant match

Despite the downturn in the economy, Peachtree City has an opportunity for a federal grant that would partially fund six new firefighting positions over a five-year period.

The grant would pay $650,280 over the five years and the city would be responsible for the remaining $1.02 million. The city’s outlay in the first year is projected at $50,238 for the first year.

But those funds will come at a cost as the fire department is proposing to delay a number of purchases for a year including dive team and water rescue equipment, firefighting foam, station cleaning supplies and more.

Also the department is diverting money from professional services including funds for drug screening, medical physicals and vaccines in addition to foregoing several training conferences.

The six firefighters will add two firefighters per shift for a total of 19 firefighters at all four fire stations.

The City Council is expected to vote on the grant at its regular meeting Thursday night.

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Submitted by Bonkers on Mon, 08/17/2009 - 9:41am.

It is borrowed money from Washington!
They don't have it either!
Anyway after five years and a total depletion of supplies to pay the extra million evey year, you will have to pay for all of them in total!

A sneaky way to raise taxes next year and beyond.

Besides any heads added to the city budget will NEVER be removed. Near 80 now in the FD huh?

Submitted by Bonkers on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 1:49pm.

Do we still have ANY volunteer firefighters?
Is there even an ongoing training program to use any?

Is it too much trouble (like the mowing, Tennis, and Ampnitheater) for the town to manage anything to reduce costs?

Submitted by intheknow on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 4:32pm.

As usual, you just don't have a clue as to what you ramble about.
First, let me say, yes, PCFD does have volunteers, in fact we have more than ever before (around 75 volunteers), and have continually held as many as two or three volunteer recruit classes annually for the last eight or nine years.
We've also become known as somewhat of a regional training ground for the Atlanta area, as many of those we train and certify as firefighters, go on to careers with other area agencies. I'm sure by now probably 50 or more personnel we've trained as volunteers to be firefighters now work as career firefighters for Atlanta, Clayton, Coweta, Newnan, Fayette, Dekalb, etc... Ultimately, to answer your question, Yes we do have "volunteers", and in regards to "an ongoing training program" we do that probably better than any agency around.
Some additional facts for you, volunteer firefighters tend to have a short life cycle, maybe due to the hundreds of hours required in training just to become one, or the hundreds of hours required every year in training to stay one, let alone the hundreds of hours required to staff stations and respond to calls. Which brings me to your next item regarding the grant.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security awards various types of grants to fire departments across the US, and has for several years. The purpose of the Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grants, which is this grant received, is to help fire departments increase the number of frontline firefighters. The goal is for fire departments to increase their staffing and deployment capabilities and ultimately attain 24-hour staffing, thus assuring that their communities have adequate protection from fire and fire-related hazards. This is the same grant that was awarded to the City of Fayetteville Fire Department last year, where they received $948,825.00 to hire nine (9) personnel. Other departments in the Atlanta area to receive this grant this year include:
College Park Fire Department - $1,300,560.00 for 12 additional personnel
Forsyth County Fire Department - $1,950,840.00 - 18 additional personnel
Dekalb County Fire Department - - $6,891,405.00 - 64 additional personnel
Several other departments around the state also received this grant in this years round, as well as dozens of departments nationwide, all to improve their deployment capabilities to protect their citizens.
As far as your "Near 80 now in the FD huh?" comment, I guess again we could chalk that up to your lack of knowledge, like the many other topics you regularly comment on in this forum. With the addition of the six personnel in this grant, (two personnel per shift), added to the cities four fire stations, PCFD will have 19 personnel per shift, thats 57 line personnel. Of course this doesn't include administrative staff of the Fire Chief, Assistant Chief, the EMS Officer or Fire Marshall's office and Training officers, still not quite near the 80 you speak of. PCFD was tremendously below needed staffing levels for many years, based on the call volume, the services provided (including EMS transport), the known hazards and risks in the city, with this grant, Peachtree City Fire Department will finally be close to attaining a safe and adequate level of on-duty staffing.

Submitted by Bonkers on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 5:04am.

By all means don't include all personnel not on "line" duty---they apparently don't get paid, or do they about as much as the 57?

75 "volunteers" working how many hours per week total?

Maybe you need to recruit people with a "job" who will volunteer and stay as a service to PTC?

All that money to everyone locally from Washington must mean that the cities are all democrat?

Just don't pee on my boot..........

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