LETTERS TO THE EDITOR | Firefighter supports levy
May 11, 2012 · Updated 3:00 PM
To the editor:
I have been a firefighter with South Whidbey Fire/EMS for 11 years and, from what I’ve seen, the district has been a good steward of my tax money. I may not agree with every cent of every expenditure, but I firmly believe that they are well reasoned expenses and I support the levy lift.
Yes, medical calls comprise the greatest majority of calls, and yes, the fire/accident/service response costs comprise the greatest majority of the costs. That’s simply the nature of the beast. Training, apparatus, equipment and facilities for the fire side are tremendously expensive, but when you need them, you’d better have them.
And yes, money is spent on recruitment and retention of volunteers. Having a volunteer district instead of paid employees saves the taxpayers well over $1 million a year.
I don’t mind standing in the rain directing traffic around an accident scene. I don’t mind being called out to remove a downed tree during a storm. I don’t mind being woken up in the middle of the night or being paged at other inconvenient times. But if the community doesn’t want to help support me with a few extra dollars a month so services can continue to be provided at current levels, I may start to think, why bother?
Charlie Bieber
Clinton
Comment on this story.
So keep your comments:
- Civil
- Smart
- On-topic
- Free of profanity
We ask that all participants own their words by logging in with their Facebook account. It's a simple process that will take seconds and helps keep our comments free of trolls, cranks, and “drive-by” commenters. We reserve the right to remove comments from anyone using screen names, pseudonyms or false identities. Please refer to our Terms of Use for full detail on participating on our site.
