We voted, and now we will spend $2.9 Million so that all the firefighters in Escambia County---paid and volunteer--will have brand-new, certified and fully OSHA compliant respirator equipment for use in fighting fires.
We've recently funded millions in change orders for repairs to the fire trucks and also for the purchase of several new engines. We are working a plan for a fire training facility and I am working diligently to modernize the fire station in Beulah--there is $3.5 Million already earmarked for that project. Add to this that over the last 6 years the BCC has increased the fire service budget geometrically--and the reality becomes very clear. This board cares about fire service, and we are putting resources into fire. But we can't fix issues if they are not brought to our attention.
So how did this situation, with the respirators, come to a boiling point so quickly--how was it allowed to come to a point that board members at the 11th hour and 59th minute were told that non-compliant, out of date, and potentially dangerous life-packs were being used by our firefighters in Escambia County?
Like many other issues that we have had to tackle in crisis-mode for the last several years, it appears this situation developed because of a leadership vacuum in which folks in their stove-pipe areas were precluded from coming forward with this issue. Whether it was because of budgets, or perceptions, or fear for job, or [fill in the blank] we the BCC members were not told about this issue. Had we have been told, I am confident we would have acted.
People must have the backbone to bring important issues to their supervisors and then to the board--
