Letter: Tiverton needs a Fire Department fix

To the editor:

After reading the story about the special Town Council meeting dealing with Fire Department employee retention, I had to respond. It never seems to end — either we are having a hard time recruiting, or they leave for more money in another town. It has been a problem for decades, and there are a lot of reasons why. The problems are both economic and a bad work environment.

Taxpayers payed out a huge amount of money recently to an employee who was fired. The whole thing was because of bad management practices starting with the town administrator who was in charge at the time. It's all public record if people want to fact check. We could have bought two new ambulances with that money.

I offered a solution years ago to solve the problem in our Fire Department. I had no support from councilors, and was ridiculed by some.

My plan was to split the Fire Dartment in two parts. Fire service would deal with fires and emergencies.  Ambulance service would be the specially trained personal who deal with the medical emergencies. They will ask, "what if the ambulance is busy?” We have two ambulances, and several towns that give mutual aid five minutes away.

The firefighters would be trained in fire fighting, emergencies like car wrecks, and disasters . These men would have basic life saving training.

We also need firefighting training for volunteers who would like to pursue a carrier in this field — local people who want to be part of our Fire Department and not use it as a stepping. stone.  

We are a small town with a nagging problem, and more money will not fix it. Breaking the Fire Department in two is the best option. Look at other town around us and see which ones have the similar problems. Make your own comparison like I did. We can fix the problem once and for all.

Joe Sousa

Tiverton