More Perplexing City (or should I say mayoral) Nonesense...
In this Toledo Blade entitled, “Toledo to cut 11 to 13 cadets in police class,” duh mayor's fuzzy math again rasies its ugly head.
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081107/NEWS16/811070341/-1/NEWS
Let's see if I've got this picture right.
We're (well, actually duh mayor) going want to cut the number in the new (that'll be the day) Police class from a miserly 33 cadets down to 20-22.
-while simultaneously-
boosting the equally miserly fire class from 25 to 40 cadets/recruits.
The apparent reason:
Fire has a minimum manning level in their contract and meeting the required levels requires mucho overtime.
But Police has no such requirement and the can continually get away with 1 crew covering 3 or more districts, because, to be blunt, they have been very lucky so far.
If a fire station were to be closed, much stink would arise along with much bad news, at least in the electronic media, while the long time practice of leaving vast parts of the city lightly patrolled goes unreported/unnoticed. The print media (namely the daily loco) hears/sees/tels no story.
And never mind His Dishonor's Campaign promises about bolstering public safety forces, or the statistics or the falling ranks of the uniformed forces, they did their job in getting duh mayor reelected, and that's all that matters (to duh mayor).
Besides, at the rate that those who are able to are fleeing this city, crime should logically fall while fires (mainly vacant/abandoned structures) requires more firefighters.
Side Note:
Because of declining population though, the elderly aren't likely (for various reasons) to leave, so EMS/Rescue service calls continue to rise.
That's the picture as I see it, what say you?
(I deliberately left out the issue of rich, but overworked/over divorced public safety officers because it seems to be of little/no concern to our “beloved” mayor; that's a topic for a whole nother rant...)
2 comments:
HT,
You don't think that other than the union contract on staffing, that Toledo is counting on the higher staffing to put the remaining ambulance businesses out of business, do you? Could this encroachment on private business already have an impact on fire department costs in overtime?
As to the level of police staffing, we are already hearing that a tightening economy and loss of jobs is raising the level of theft in the city. Go figure.
Tim,
No, that minimum manning level wouldn't allow for enough manpower to further encroach on the privates unless more ALS squads were purchased/leased and the smaller squads were to be replaced by/with them. (But, don't give duh mayor any ideas...)
As for the cops, as Dan Wagner just said on the radio, we are going to lose a ton of cops in 2010 when those in "the drop" program will be forced to leave.
And, it ain't gonna get no better from that point on, as hundreds of police are in the program and they have to retire after 8-years....
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