Let me give a little background first. I joined the Putnam Fire Department in 1994 at the age of 18, and spent nearly 14 years with that department rising through the ranks from Firefighter, to Driver/Operator, then Lieutenant, and eventually resigned this May as an Engine Company Captain. I joined Putnam Ems in 1996 as one of the first Driver/MRT's, and started my dispatching career in 1997 with Station WA, otherwise known as Putnam Dispatch. Since then I've dispatched at Station WW(Willimantic) for a brief period of time before my daughter was born, along with having dispatched for American Ambulance from 2000 to 2006, before accepting my current position with Quinebaug Valley Emergency Communications, Inc. which is a regional dispatch center.
By the way, the signs above the doors, yeah, I made themWhen I first started out in Putnam, I believed it was one of the best volunteer fire departments in the eastern half of the state. See, we had a great budget, the best equipment and apparatus, city water (hydrants) that let us play with as much water as we wanted, didn't respond to those "stupid" medical calls cause the ambulance would handle it, and high call volume of fires (both in-town and mutual aid, thus having experienced and state certified members). We used to share radio frequencies with all the other departments, and if it was busy, the radio traffic would be crazy. So we ended up getting our own radio frequency that we could operate our own calls, and if we needed help, we'd use the old ones to talk to other departments coming to help. The district is compact and highly populated compared to our neighboring towns, so our members lived close to the station, which would allow us to "get out the door" real quick. The quick responses, hydrants, along with many highly certified and experienced members allowed us to handle calls by ourselves, compared to our neighbors who were more rural and needed help with water supply and manpower. So the only time we called mutual aid in to help us, was during large incidences like mill fires, large brush fires, or fully involved houses with exposure problems(houses close to the fire building at risk of catching fire).
This lead to other departments feeling that "Putnam thinks they're too good for our help", or Putnam does things their own way. Which was true, we'd go to other towns for fires, sometimes take over the scenes, most of the time staying on our own frequency, working by ourselves, did what we needed to do and then went home. Gradually over the years I noticed we weren't getting invited to play with others as much as we used to. It seemed like each year, we'd piss someone off, get pulled off an alarm card or two, and before we knew it, we were hardly ever requested to go help out. The majority of the attitudes in Putnam wasn't "how can we fix this and work with others", but "screw mutual aid, we'll just stay in town and take care of ourselves, and just go when we're actually called."
Now East Putnam was our neighboring department, and the leadership was questionable for years, with internal problems. Putnam has the heavy rescue, and Putnam has the Ladder truck, so we'd go to East Putnam with our fully manned trucks, and take over scenes, do our own thing, and head home when the job was done. The relationship was rocky to say the least, but about 6 years ago EPFD had a change in leadership. Younger, more responsible members took over, and started straightening out East Putnam and getting many more younger members. The relationship was going good, but we (Putnam) was still in our "we got it" attitude. The new East Putnam chief asked the Putnam chief officers several times to reduce the apparatus during mutual aid calls, because East Putnam had a set alarm card, and there was no need for two engines, the ladder, and the heavy rescue for fires. Their main concern was water supply(no hydrants in East Putnam), and Putnam wasn't helping them with 750 gallons of water on an engine, when they needed tankers with 2000-3000 gallons. The EPFD chief only wanted one attack engine and the ladder truck fully staffed for the manpower, because he had other departments coming in with tankers for water. Each time he asked our "old school" chief officers, they told him no, you want us, we bring what we want! Now, if the shoes were reversed and other departments wouldn't listen to PFD wishes, they'd be infuriated, and would of stopped calling that department to help. I witnessed a grudge for years with Putnam and Pomfret for similar reasons, and actually was at a call where a PFD chief called another department's ladder truck, to come through Pomfret's district(who was closer) and come fight a fire in Putnam, when Pomfret heard the call and had a full crew and a brand new Tower/Ladder truck sitting in their station ready to go!!
So after several attempts by the new EPFD chief to talk with the PFD chiefs, and talking to the Mayor about the situation with no change, he decided to do what other departments had done over the years and pull PFD from his automatic alarm cards. Not to say he wouldn't call on us and use us, but the automatic dispatch for us was no longer, because we wouldn't respect his wishes, like we did of certain other chiefs. Now this "pulling of the alarm card" was a sore topic now at officers meetings in Putnam, and it drove me crazy.
See, I was now dispatching at QV dealing with 37 other departments that all had alarm cards, and worked well together. I would take methods and ideas back to the officers meetings, suggested an alarm card and new ways of doing things, but always got shot down. "We do things our way", "we don't need an alarm card, we call who we want", or "why do we want to do it like that, our way has always worked." You know, the traditional, old fashioned kind of thinking. Then there was a retirement which lead to two promotions, one of which was for another captain's spot similar to mine. There were three canidates, and the interview process was a joke and a debacle. The two most dedicated and deserving candidates were immediately overlooked, and a less deserving, undedicated, rule-breaking "pet" of the chiefs was chosen over the other two, including my awesome lieutenant. I totally disagreed with that and it bothered me to the core, because PFD was my life, and second family. So I tried to deal with the railroading for a few months, but it eventually got to me and I resigned and went to join one of my best friends in East Putnam.
Suddenly, the PFD chiefs were willing to reduce their mutual aid assignment to the engine and ladder, and were willing to do whatever the EPFD chief wanted. Although the Mayor was involved, and there is still some tension between the chiefs of both departments, the departments have gone on calls together, in each others districts, and have worked well together to get the job done. The problem was beginning to go away, and we were/still are, working through the problem, but then the above link came about. Now the local radio talk show, and newspapers are making a huge deal about this, and the totally separate issue of 911 calls. The Mayor probably thinks this 911 issue is about the PFD/EPFD feud, and is giving East Putnam officials a hard time over something that can be easily fixed with a simple signature....
I hate to quote it, but as Rodney King of LAPD and LA riots fame once said, "Can't we all just get along!!"..
