Detroit budget proposal would cut $52 million from police, fire

[davewindsor]

It has almost nothing in common with Detroit. Most of Troy was developed since the advent of modern fire codes. Most of Detroit was not. The homes in Troy aren't packed on top of each other where a fire in one can quickly spread to others, as happens all too often in Detroit. Troy doesn't have thousands of abandoned and vacant buildings, many of them fire traps that can collapse at a moment's notice. Troy doesn't have a population that lacks the ability to pay for basic medical services and relies heavily on emergency services to address all levels of emergency care. In short, Troy is nothing like Detroit.

This is so ridiculous, Novine. What are you saying now?! So, volunteers in Troy who have the technical knowhow to deal with a fire breaking out in a 25 story office tower do not know how to connect a hose to a fire hydrant and hose down a fire that broke out across several abandoned townhouses? Gimme a break. Volunteers in Troy are not imbeciles because they are volunteers. Just the opposite. I'm sure a lot of those volunteers are highly qualified engineers and other relevant trades in their regular jobs and offer a lot of transferable skills and training that a professional DFD firefighter wouldn't have when they volunteer. You're just defending your paycheck at the expense of insulting the good people who volunteer their time for nothing other than wanting to help their fellow man.

[mwilbert]

I really think Novine is arguing against a straw man here. There are no cities in the US anywhere near the size of Detroit that have a volunteer fire department. Detroit isn't going to have one either, and as far as I can see Davewindsor wasn't proposing that. What I thought he was suggesting is that Detroit could supplement its fire department with volunteers, which seems reasonable to me, as this is done in many cities, including large ones with challenging conditions like New York and Berlin.

If people think that would be a bad idea, they should argue against that, not against the idea of volunteer fire departments in general. I will make one argument, which is that while I think it might be a good idea in the abstract, in a context where professional firefighters are very likely to be laid off, it is easy to see how there could be some serious friction between the professionals and the volunteers--this is the sort of program that would be a lot easier to implement when people aren't worried about their jobs.