Reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept.

[Guest Guest]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

[Guest guest]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

do u really think that taxes would be lowered you are truely an idiot.

[Guest Harrison Senior]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

Question for Barney: If you're such an expert in public safety, why are you still a patrolman? I would think

a man of your intellect would be fast-tracked to the top.

[doc13mets]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

You can't do anything with two men on an engine. You obviously have no idea how an engine works.

[Guest Guest]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

Yes, I agree we need people to realize that this is the biggest burden on our taxes, there are just too many fire fighters, I think 52, and only 9 are on on any given time. As you posted we could have an hybrid department and the job would be done just as well. Intelligence and responsibility is what is going to bring Harrison out of the hole. Thank you, you got my vote

[Guest Guest]

Question for Barney: If you're such an expert in public safety, why are you still a patrolman? I would think

a man of your intellect would be fast-tracked to the top.

I'm not Barney, not a patrolman, and I am at the top of my field. Why would oppose such a plan unless you stood to benefit by the status Quo. Whats your plan to save the town millions? is it to sit behind your computer and show people how ignorant you are?

[Guest Guest]

do u really think that taxes would be lowered you are truely an idiot.

You are the idiot if you cannot understand the state of Harrison. You are obviously not a Harrison resident and do not contribute to our Debt, not to understand how intelligent and real the person that posted the reorganization of the fire department is. Yes, Yes, Yes we will soon get to that point.

[Guest Guest]

You are the idiot if you cannot understand the state of Harrison. You are obviously not a Harrison resident and do not contribute to our Debt, not to understand how intelligent and real the person that posted the reorganization of the fire department is. Yes, Yes, Yes we will soon get to that point.

I agree that the HFD should be reorganized. They have too much rank and not enough fireman. Get rid of the dead wood through retirements. Train volunteers to take their place. Volunteers could be given LOSAP which is a small retirement benifit. Harrison can no longer afford a fully paid FD. No one will lose their jobs.

With volunteers, you could have 5 men or woman per engine. You only need 8 Captains and 4 battalian Chiefs. A public safety director should replace the Police and Fire Chiefs.

[doc13mets]

Yes, I agree we need people to realize that this is the biggest burden on our taxes, there are just too many fire fighters, I think 52, and only 9 are on on any given time. As you posted we could have an hybrid department and the job would be done just as well. Intelligence and responsibility is what is going to bring Harrison out of the hole. Thank you, you got my vote

Haven't looked at a Budget recently but I would be willing to place a wager that Education is the biggest % of Harrison residents tax bills.

[Guest Harrison Senior]

I'm not Barney, not a patrolman, and I am at the top of my field. Why would oppose such a plan unless you stood to benefit by the status Quo. Whats your plan to save the town millions? is it to sit behind your computer and show people how ignorant you are?

Barney, I'll try to explain this so even you can understand it. With the closely built construction in Harrison, a quick response time with a full crew is vital to saving life and preventing the fire from spreading to other buildings. Waiting for town workers who may be on the other side of town digging a ditch to respond to the fire is ridiculous. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a town worker with her apartment on fire??

A volunteer dept can work in a suburban setting where there's 20 feet between the houses and there's no danger of spreading. And they have their problems with response times during daytime hours when most are working and after midnight when they're home in bed. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a volunteer sleeping at home with her apartment on fire??

Consolidation with Kearny could offer a small savings, not enough to make much of a difference, even if the Town of Kearny was interested, which they're not.

So Barney, I hope I was able to help with your ignorance of FD operations, if I can help you with anything else, let me know.

[Guest Guest]

Yes, I agree we need people to realize that this is the biggest burden on our taxes, there are just too many fire fighters, I think 52, and only 9 are on on any given time. As you posted we could have an hybrid department and the job would be done just as well. Intelligence and responsibility is what is going to bring Harrison out of the hole. Thank you, you got my vote

Barney, you're so clever. You post as "Guest" and then you answer yourself as "Guest". You should be in the DB.

[doc13mets]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

You are the idiot if you cannot understand the state of Harrison. You are obviously not a Harrison resident and do not contribute to our Debt, not to understand how intelligent and real the person that posted the reorganization of the fire department is. Yes, Yes, Yes we will soon get to that point.

You say the above poster is intelligent. Do you not realize the majority of the post can't happen? You can't just give town employee's an extra $20000 a year in salary to be a Volly. You have to treat all the volly's the same. Paramus Vollunteers are the highest I've ever heard of in terms of stipends. They can recieve up to $500 a month. You couldn't just pay some random town employee OT for responding off hours and not give another resident who may be responding the same deal. It's discrimination. Having a combo paid/volly department isn't exactly as smooth as you make it out to be. You talk about not compromising saftey one bit and you want to roll out an engine with 2 people!? Are you nuts??? NFPA studies clearly demonstrate that for "safe, effective and efficient fire suppression, each responding company needs a minimum of four fire fighters." And cutting the fire department will not save as much tax money as people seem to think.

[Guest Guest]

Barney, I'll try to explain this so even you can understand it. With the closely built construction in Harrison, a quick response time with a full crew is vital to saving life and preventing the fire from spreading to other buildings. Waiting for town workers who may be on the other side of town digging a ditch to respond to the fire is ridiculous. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a town worker with her apartment on fire??

A volunteer dept can work in a suburban setting where there's 20 feet between the houses and there's no danger of spreading. And they have their problems with response times during daytime hours when most are working and after midnight when they're home in bed. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a volunteer sleeping at home with her apartment on fire??

Consolidation with Kearny could offer a small savings, not enough to make much of a difference, even if the Town of Kearny was interested, which they're not.

So Barney, I hope I was able to help with your ignorance of FD operations, if I can help you with anything else, let me know.

Please don't try to overstate your importance. Two men on an engine with a captain would mean seven paid firemen on duty at all times. Town workers live in the one mile square town and can respond to a working fire within two minutes, faster that any mutual aid can. Town worker volunteers are already in a pension plan and already receive health benefits. We would have more persons respond immediately to a fire than we have now. And we wouldn't have to pay for clean linen so they could sleep in the fire house like we do now.

I'll bet you sit in the firehouse and pet Barney all day.

[Guest Harrison's Bravest]

Please don't try to overstate your importance. Two men on an engine with a captain would mean seven paid firemen on duty at all times. Town workers live in the one mile square town and can respond to a working fire within two minutes, faster that any mutual aid can. Town worker volunteers are already in a pension plan and already receive health benefits. We would have more persons respond immediately to a fire than we have now. And we wouldn't have to pay for clean linen so they could sleep in the fire house like we do now.

I'll bet you sit in the firehouse and pet Barney all day.

Barney, I've been reading your posts with amusement over how ignorant you are about fire dept. operations. Your remarks are simply nonsense and would be laughed at by anyone with an ounce of brains. Why don't you go to the next council meeting and tell everyone that you've solved the towns financial

problems. Who knows, you may be hired as a fire service consultant at $300.00 an hour to save the town.

[Guest Guest]

Barney, I've been reading your posts with amusement over how ignorant you are about fire dept. operations. Your remarks are simply nonsense and would be laughed at by anyone with an ounce of brains. Why don't you go to the next council meeting and tell everyone that you've solved the towns financial

problems. Who knows, you may be hired as a fire service consultant at $300.00 an hour to save the town.

I think you are the ignorant one if you think taxpayers are going to continually pay increasing taxes so you can pet Barney in the firehouse, and hose the public. No one wants to lose fire protection but it is like insurance, how much is enough? Your fear of mom dying in a fire is matched with increased rents, and higher taxes. Nine million a year for a fire department is a good place to look for cuts. No one will lose their jobs, and for a change the taxpayer won't have to bend over.

[Guest Guest]

You say the above poster is intelligent. Do you not realize the majority of the post can't happen? You can't just give town employee's an extra $20000 a year in salary to be a Volly. You have to treat all the volly's the same. Paramus Vollunteers are the highest I've ever heard of in terms of stipends. They can recieve up to $500 a month. You couldn't just pay some random town employee OT for responding off hours and not give another resident who may be responding the same deal. It's discrimination. Having a combo paid/volly department isn't exactly as smooth as you make it out to be. You talk about not compromising saftey one bit and you want to roll out an engine with 2 people!? Are you nuts??? NFPA studies clearly demonstrate that for "safe, effective and efficient fire suppression, each responding company needs a minimum of four fire fighters." And cutting the fire department will not save as much tax money as people seem to think.

I may not know how to fight fires, but I know what I can afford to pay in taxes. I agree we should have more men on an engine. I think we should have ten men on an engine, but I can't afford that. Seven trained men responding to a fire should be enough to hold the fort until more men arrive.

The Harrison fire Dept. Is considered by many as one of the worlds best jobs, and you know it. Why don't you give your ambulance call money to the town treasury instead of dividing half of it amongst the EMT's? Why don't you take just eight hours when you call in sick, like every other town worker? Why do you need more than 15 six days a year, so you can leave the Dept. with hundreds of thousands in unused sick time? Your milking the taxpayers days are coming to an end. If the town has to cut somewhere, you are a good place to start.

I'll bet your petting your Barney as you read this.

[Guest Guest]

Barney, I'll try to explain this so even you can understand it. With the closely built construction in Harrison, a quick response time with a full crew is vital to saving life and preventing the fire from spreading to other buildings. Waiting for town workers who may be on the other side of town digging a ditch to respond to the fire is ridiculous. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a town worker with her apartment on fire??

A volunteer dept can work in a suburban setting where there's 20 feet between the houses and there's no danger of spreading. And they have their problems with response times during daytime hours when most are working and after midnight when they're home in bed. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a volunteer sleeping at home with her apartment on fire??

Consolidation with Kearny could offer a small savings, not enough to make much of a difference, even if the Town of Kearny was interested, which they're not.

So Barney, I hope I was able to help with your ignorance of FD operations, if I can help you with anything else, let me know.

Did you tell East Newark that a volunteer Dept can't work in a urban setting ?

[Guest Guest]

Now is the time to reorganize the Harrison Fire Dept. We can do very well with only two men on an engine, with a captain in charge of the shift. We can supplement the Dept. with volunteers. We can use town employees, heaven knows we have enough of them. If we gave each town employee an extra $20,000 a year in salary to be a volunteer, we would get many of them to join. We could pay them overtime if they are called out when they are not normally working. We could have a third tier of firemen who are volunteers from the community. I'm sure we could get at least a dozen men from Harrison to volunteer. The Town would save millions, and still have both a paid department supported by volunteers. We paid to train firemen as EMT's we can certainly pay to train volunteer firemen. This one move would be enough to cut taxes for the first time in many years in Harrison and would not compromise safety one bit. None of the existing firemen would loose their jobs and this could all be accomplished thru attrition.

If you paid them anything, you could not call them volunteers, but not a bad idea. I doubt you'd get 12 from the general population without paying them something, because they have to undergo vigerous training.

[Guest Guest]

Barney, I'll try to explain this so even you can understand it. With the closely built construction in Harrison, a quick response time with a full crew is vital to saving life and preventing the fire from spreading to other buildings. Waiting for town workers who may be on the other side of town digging a ditch to respond to the fire is ridiculous. Would you want your mother to be waiting on a town worker with her apartment on fire??

since when does HFD respond with a full crew. They have to call KFD and half the state for any working fire.

[Guest Harrison Senior]

Barney, I've been reading your posts with amusement over how ignorant you are about fire dept. operations. Your remarks are simply nonsense and would be laughed at by anyone with an ounce of brains. Why don't you go to the next council meeting and tell everyone that you've solved the towns financial

problems. Who knows, you may be hired as a fire service consultant at $300.00 an hour to save the town.

No chance of Barney ever standing up at a council meeting, he does all his bomb throwing in the security of his bedroom.

[Guest Guest]

No chance of Barney ever standing up at a council meeting, he does all his bomb throwing in the security of his bedroom.

Aren't you the tough guy that is always inviting people to the fire house to discuss their opinions? I don't have to stand up at a town council meeting to solve the town's problems. Anyone becoming mayor will see what a mess the town is in, and cuts will have to be made. How much do you want to bet the fire Dept., is where he will start? We can't afford to keep you in your present role of Barney petter. Put Barney back in your p----s and get real.

[Guest Harrison Senior]

Aren't you the tough guy that is always inviting people to the fire house to discuss their opinions? I don't have to stand up at a town council meeting to solve the town's problems. Anyone becoming mayor will see what a mess the town is in, and cuts will have to be made. How much do you want to bet the fire Dept., is where he will start? We can't afford to keep you in your present role of Barney petter. Put Barney back in your p----s and get real.

Wrong again, Barney. I don't work at the FD.

[Guest Guest]

Wrong again, Barney. I don't work at the FD.

No need to tell us you don't work in the FD, every single person in town with any smarts knows that most of the time the FD sleeps, eats and sits arounds doing nothing, and thats a good thing that we are not faced with many fires but when we are we expect the FD to do their Job, and East Newark and Kearny and Jersey City all come to help you, so what would be the difference with a volunteer FD? You do make sense when you say to dont work at the FD, but Harrisonians pay out their butts for the FD, can you feel that burden as a person and not as a highly paid member of the FD that probably does not live in our community?

[Guest Harrison Senior]

No need to tell us you don't work in the FD, every single person in town with any smarts knows that most of the time the FD sleeps, eats and sits arounds doing nothing, and thats a good thing that we are not faced with many fires but when we are we expect the FD to do their Job, and East Newark and Kearny and Jersey City all come to help you, so what would be the difference with a volunteer FD? You do make sense when you say to dont work at the FD, but Harrisonians pay out their butts for the FD, can you feel that burden as a person and not as a highly paid member of the FD that probably does not live in our community?

Barney, Barney, Barney. Your anger issues are getting the best of you. I only hope that if you're married you're not taking out your hostility on your wife

and kids. For a cop living at the shore and commuting to Harrison to work (when you're not calling out sick), you should be more concerned with doing your job and letting the professional firefighters who protect Harrison do theirs.

I'm sure your health plan provides for psychological sevices, you should talk to someone about your anger issues, it's really not normal. Good luck.

[Guest limp hose]

Barney, Barney, Barney. Your anger issues are getting the best of you. I only hope that if you're married you're not taking out your hostility on your wife

and kids. For a cop living at the shore and commuting to Harrison to work (when you're not calling out sick), you should be more concerned with doing your job and letting the professional firefighters who protect Harrison do theirs.

I'm sure your health plan provides for psychological sevices, you should talk to someone about your anger issues, it's really not normal. Good luck.

The deflection tactics you are attempting to use ie: Barney! Barney! just prove that you know that you and your Dept. are in serious trouble. The game is just about over check the classified and see if you're qualified for a real job!!!!!!