Vanguard Responds to Puntillo’s Fire Op-Ed

“What I want are police officers out there that are using their training and their instincts, I don’t want them thinking about oh somebody’s going to be reviewing what I’m doing.”

So I find it little surprising that Mr. Puntillo jumps into the fray on behalf of the fire department and as per the usual, he does so without a lot of facts or research.  The facts he cites are either wrong, taken out of context, or simply refuted by other more pertinent facts.  However, I believe a thorough response is required here to counter the misinformation that Mr. Puntillo presents.

Mr. Puntillo’s prime argument is that the three-person engine is substandard.  He argues that there is a minimum four-person staffing requirement for municipal departments.

Our research suggests that while OSHA maintains the “two-in, two-out” standard, the staffing requirements by which to accomplish that standard have considerable flexibility.

As we suggested on April 10, 2009, a letter to Congress from OSHA in 1999 clarifies that this standard is not a staffing requirement but rather a worker safety practice.

“It does not require fire departments to hire additional firefighters; it does not require four-person fire companies; it does not require four persons on a fire truck. Most fire departments have more than four firefighters and can assemble the numbers required on the scene by waiting for others to arrive. During this time the fire may be attacked from the outside, sizing-up operations may occur, and emergency rescue necessary to save lives may take place. Additional staff can be assembled by such means as calling for a second fire company at the scene, calling in additional firefighters who are on standby, and calling on other nearby fire departments when necessary.”

Furthermore the OSHA ruling acknowledges hardship and limitation for smaller fire departments that such a staffing requirement would impose:

“It is anticipated that small fire departments may rely on “mutual aid” agreements with neighboring jurisdictions to supply additional firefighters to assist with interior structural firefighting, if that is necessary to ensure compliance with “two-in, two-out.” The intent of the “two-in, two-out” rule is a worker safety practice requirement, not a staffing requirement.”

This is precisely the conundrum that cities like Davis are dealing with.

If Mr. Puntillo had been reading the Vanguard he would know that four person engine teams are hardly the norm among most fire departments in comparable sized cities.

When we compared Davis to 11 other comparable cities, we found that just two others had exclusively four person teams–Folsom and West Sacramento.  In the meantime, Berkeley, Fairfield, Napa, Palo Alto, Roseville, Vacaville, San Luis Obispo, Woodland, and Chico have three-person teams.  Many of these cities have shifted to three person teams from four person teams for the same reasons that Davis now needs to consider it.

So for Mr. Puntillo to suggest that four is somehow the norm, is erroneous. 

Mr. Puntillo proceeds to make the same argument that the fire department does, suggesting that Davis spends substantially less than surrounding communities on per-capita fire service.

“The fact is that Davis’ per-capita fire service expenditures are already less – sometimes substantially less – than surrounding communities. Out of 13 California cities of comparable size, Davis ranks 11th in the number of firefighters per 1,000 population.”

“Even at our current expenditure levels, Davis is able to meet the five-minute response standard only half the time, and several sections of our city are simply too far away from a fire station for anybody to get there within five minutes. Reducing fire staffing levels will further erode a safety situation already sitting at a knife’s point.”

It took some time to figure out his point here.  After all it is not immediately apparent how a four person engine team versus a three person engine team would make a difference in response time.  After further consideration, it seems likely this is an argument in favor of a fourth fire station.  At this point, I do not know where the city would get the money to do that.  However, that is a separate issue from fire staffing.

He continues:

“Nobody doubts the challenges of our current fiscal mess. But in public safety, money saved is time lost. I simply do not believe the money saved justifies putting our city at risk. We may have ‘gotten along perfectly fine’ with three at one time – but not anymore.”

And yet most other cities appear to be getting along fine with three at one time.  After all the department only responded to 35 structure fires last year.  It would seem that the fire department could figure out an arrangement to provide the numbers they need for such emergencies.

Moreover, Mr. Puntillo simply does not seem to understand the magnitude of our budget crisis.

The problem is that the city faces a huge deficit and a larger structural problem.  It’s easy to focus on public safety as a function of simply fire and police, but we have $13 million of unmet needs much of which is unrepaired roads and infrastructure in need of upgrades, that is a potential public safety problem as well.

The city is facing the cutbacks in services across the board and a primary culprit is the amount that we have put into not just staffing but salaries, overtime, and of course, retirement.

Is the department willing to give on anything?  After all, we might be able to continue with four person teams if they were willing to take a cutback in salaries and contribute more to their retirement benefit packages.  Are they?

However, it appears that most cities in California utilize three person fire teams and they utilize them for more service calls per capita than Davis.  It would appear that this is simply a luxury rather than a necessity and given the short-term and long-term economic picture it is simply a luxury that we can no longer afford.

It is a shame that Mr. Puntillo did not want to do more thorough research for his piece, he could have been a great asset in this discussion.  As it is, he shed more heat than light on the topic, something he has often charged others with doing.

—David M. Greenwald reporting