Welcome to RichardSpackmann.com! I post various activities I participate in with the Maple Avenue Fire Department, and personal opinions surrounding my position as Fire Commissioner of the Greenfield Fire District. The most recent entries are listed first, but you can also sort based on the categories listed below, or search by date via the calendar to the lower right. (All times are in Eastern Standard Time [GMT-5])
Friday, June 27
2009 Budget Thoughts
The budget process is always a long and critical one - on a personal note, I find it particularly challenging when I have to make a decision to cut funds to deny a particular worthy request - but that's the balancing act that I strongly believe the Commissioners must play - even when its unpopular.
I wanted to share some preliminary thoughts on what I would like to focus on for next year's budget.
Generator service contracts: the fire district is committed to installing generators in each firehouse - and they all come with a heavy (but worth it) price tag. We really should be focused on protecting these investiments by getting annual service contracts. Furthermore, as emergency generators - we should really be ensuring that they are maintained so that they do work when they are needed. We discussed this idea in yesterday's workshop, so I will know more about costs in the following week or so.
Maintenance Personnel: some Commissioners have suggested that we get a maintenance person(s) and have them available to fix the variety of maintenance issues that we have in the district. Certainly that as these buildings age and get used more frequently, they will require more maintenance to maintain them - that's not a far fetched concept to grasp. I don't however see this coming with a small price tag, so its something that we will have to balance
Access System Finalization: part of the access system initiative this year was to continue with installing interior doors at various locations throughout the fire district facilities and to enable the system for remote configuration (via internet). Next year should mark the last of the installs - hopefully completing the access system initiative. In addition, there have been some suggestions of hooking the system to our siren/pagers to have it automatically unlock doors when we get a call, etc. This has already been discussed with the security company, and its a very inexpensive option that I believe we should explore.
Equipment Reserve Savings: it's clear that the ladder situation is indeed an important one to the fire district, and a costly one to the taxpayers. We have already seen that had we purchased the trucks two years ago - we would have saved over $100,000, but that is water under the bridge. The Board is now looking at consultants to determine what our ladder truck requirements actually are, and so I'll speak more about that when their report is finalized. That being said, we know that the cost to purchase a new ladder is going to be substantial, so we should try and shift as much money as possible into the Equipment Reserve in preparation for this purchase.
Software Initiative: we are currently evaluating software to streamline ALL of the paperwork processes in the GFD, something that will save our personnel and firefighters countless hours. Depending on where this evaluation goes will determine additional costs, so in the next couple of months I'll know more about what will be required for this initiative - but this is a very important initiative (and one long time coming).
The trick now becomes how achieve the above goals (hopefully all) without raising taxes (and I have some ideas on that, but those require a lot more thought).
Some have argued that it is negligent if we don't raise taxes at least a 4% standard raise - because what happens is if we don't, we end up having to raise taxes a significant amount a few years later to make up for that difference. And as I have discussed in the past, this is precisely the predicament the GFD found it self in a few years ago when I first became a commissioner.
I'm not necessarily disagreeing with that argument, but I think we can do much more with the current budget before coming to the conclusion of raising taxes. That being said, we may have no choice but to raise taxes even after restructuring line items and moving funds around. But we'll see what happens after the Board works numbers out...
If you know someone who would like to be added/removed from the mailing list, please just let me know! I've already added a few addresses to our list.
The district is planning another newsletter towards the end of the year - in the Fall time frame, but this will be a more lean newsletter and more of a summary version of remaining district events and news.
I personally believe that this style of newsletters - one "full detailed" one in the spring and a "small summary" one in the fall is definately the right fit for our district - it maximizes the information we can distribute to our constituents, and also minimizes the cost of the mailings.
Special thanks (again) to MWHDesigns who really went above and beyond in getting the newsletter together!
I have completed the final draft of this year's first edition of the newsletter. It is now in the process of being printed!
It looks as though it should be mailed towards the beginning week of May, but I'll keep everyone posted.
Many thanks to everyone who made this edition possible! I'm very proud of this edition - it speaks volumes of what the GFD does for our community!
Once the edition is finally mailed, we will be posting it for free download on the district website: www.greenfieldfd.org. I'll post a copy on this site as well. I'll post more information once I find out the status of the printing and mailing.
The gear committee met and ironed out the details of this year's gear order. The 2008 gear order is broken down as follows:
Allocate $7,500 for fire police gear
Allocate $8,900 into the gear reserve account
Allocate $60,000 for structure PPE this year broken down per company: 4 sets Greenfield Center, 5 sets Porter Corners, 9 sets Middle Grove and 5 sets Maple Avenue
I am very pleased at the compromises made on this year's gear account - I know that this budget amount was smaller than we are used to, but I think we are spending it responsibly.
Gear fittings as scheduled:
Tuesday April 15th: Greenfield Center and Porter Corners @ Greenfield Center firehouse
Tuesday April 22nd: Middle Grove fitting @ Middle Grove firehouse
Tuesday April 29th: Maple Avenue fitting @ Maple Avenue firehouse
All fittings are at 7 pm.
Note that all gear fitting schedules are posted in each firehouse in the newly installed district bulletin boards - please look at those for changes to the fitting schedule (and other district information).
You can read the proposal for the 2008 gear purchase here:
We have finally completed the installation of internet service in all firehouses of the GFD - the last installation at Porter Corners was completed in March.
The next step is to install the remote internet interface for our access system - this will provide a significantly faster way of updating and granting access to our facilities. I am expecting this step to begin at some point this summer.
We are currently investigating software options for our fire reporting requirements - Commissioner Bishop has graciously taken over the lead for this investigation (I am however still helping out but am very thankful for the help). More to follow regarding this in the coming months.
On a personal note, I believe this marks a very vital and significant milestone for our organization. Internet service really allows us to grow as an organization, and perhaps more importantly, streamline our work processes with the hope of making tedious things like paperwork much easier!
I really have to give A LOT of thanks to the many firefighters who helped the process along - many members volunteered to meet the installers during the day when I couldn't make it - they were a big help. Naturally, our district secretary was a huge help - and this initiative simply could not have been seen to completion without her help! So thanks to everyone!
More to follow on the technology front...any questions in the mean time, feel free to ask me!
I am very pleased to have the Commissioner's support to get bulletin boards installed in each firehouse. These bulletin boards are for district information only - and I believe it to be a great way to update our members about the GFD and provide a means of communication between the district and our great membership.
Many thanks to the firefighters who took care of installing them in the firehouses - you know who you are. And thanks to the firefighters who helped me install the bulletin board at Maple Avenue!
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Friday, June 27
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