Sign Up for CERT Training Now

We need everyone interested in volunteering as a firefighter, EMT, ambulance attendant driver, or what ever for the LMRFD, to take the upcoming CERT training. 

Mike Browning at Mohave County Emergency Management tells me there will be a training course for a local CERT Team, or Citizens Emergency Response Team coming up in January 2016.

At this time the training will be in Chloride or Kingman. If we get enough people, we may be able to talk them into having some classes in our area.

He needs around 20 people. So now is the time to show everyone there are good people in Dolan Springs, Meadview, and White Hills who will volunteer.

The fire district needs to support a CERT team. I think the new fire board will be interested in volunteers.

Mohave County CERT Team Information

Contact Mike Browning

• Emergency Mgmt. Assistant Coordinator, Mike Browning
• 928) 757-0930
• mike.browning@mohavecounty.us

Thanks

Jay

Mohave County Supervisors Meeting Monday Nov 2nd

Don't forget the Mohave County Supervisors meeting. It's Monday November 2nd at 9:30AM Mohave County Administration Building Offices at 700 W. Beale Street.

It's not over, we're just starting....

Jay

Check Voter registration and if You're in the LMRFD

You can check your voter registration and districts here Arizona Voters

make sure you're registered to vote, and that you're in LMRFD before the fire board election.

Jay

How to Run for the LMRFD Fire Board

I spoke to Allen at the Mohave County Elections Department about how to run for the fire board. He wasn't sure if the election would be in March or May. It should be decided at the next supervisors meeting next Monday.

If you're interested in running goto the Candidate Filing Information page. Under Non-Partisan Candidate Packet (Fire, Water, & MCC School Board): Download the checklist. Do your homework....

If you're going to run for the fire board you should talk to someone at the elections department to make sure you get things right.

Good luck
Jay

LMRFD Fire Board Meeting Today

LMRFD Fire Board Meeting Today @ 1:30 PM

Come be part of the process of building our fire district and EMS system. Don't sit just sit home, it's your community, lets stay involved in what's going on.

No Consolidation for LMRFD

The NACFD board voted 3 to 2 not to consolidate with the LMRFD last night at the NACFD board meeting. As I understand there will be a ballot by mail in some time in March.

Now it's time to establish a new fire board and get to work building an effective fire EMS system for the Dolan Springs, Meadview, and White Hills areas.

I want to thank Mr Flynn and Chief Moore for getting the LMRFD back on it'd feet, and the NACFD for allowing the people to choose a new fire board so we can continue to serve our community.

Jay

Reply to All

Reply
Sept 29 post on “DolanEMSProblems” by Jay Fleming
“So by requiring the ambulance EMT's to be firefighters we severely limit our volunteer pool. We may have a wealth of experienced women with a medical backgrounds out there who have no interest in being a firefighter. We'll never know unless we ask.”  FALSE Claim

We currently have 1 Female EMT volunteer in Meadview on the roster with NO fire. We had 1 volunteer Paramedic in Meadview, recruited, checked out, certs brought up to date by Chief Moore’s efforts.  NO fire.

The only job description ever given to me or anyone I know is for a firefighter EMT.  Show me one document from LMRFD that says volunteers don't need to be firefighters.

At the October 6 Focus Group presentation, Donna Wickerd indicated that $70,000 would be paid by the LMRFD to NACFD after consolidation as our % of operational costs.  She was not sure what that was for.  It would cover our cost of a Fire Chief, Battalion Chiefs, IT & Radio personnel, grant writer, Administration personnel services IE: payroll, payables, receivables, records management, an EMS Coordinator, and supplies purchasing.

Donna’s conclusion, however, indicated that the determination by the focus group is that “there would be NO benefit to either the LMRFD or NACFD by consolidating.”

$70,000, in my opinion, is considerable benefit to NACFD.  Chief Moore at one point stated it would buy NACFD a fire fighter.  All of the operational and management services that the $70,000 would purchase for the LMRFD is also considerable, easily costing the LMRFD $200,000/year to replicate.  The additional UNPAID benefit of a proven, stable structure already in place from which we can continue to grow our fire & EMS services, and a GOOD reputation with vendors and lending institutions is incalculable.

Donna Wickerd’s statement in her presentation that “there would be no hope of any volunteer program going forward after consolidation” because of NACFD’s “policy against a volunteer program”, is disingenuous.   Donna and other members of her group have been told repeatedly in several public meetings by Chief Moore that he is open to a volunteer program; he just needs people to show up to volunteer.  He has proven his sincerity in pursuing qualified volunteers.  The Paramedic volunteer he spent months putting through the background tests, updating of certs, etc. in 2014 showed up for a couple of calls before leaving the area in a hurry.  We currently have a female volunteer EMT on the roster in Meadview.

That's  because  when people call to volunteer, no one called them back over the past few years. Show me one web page that says NACFD is looking for volunteers. I'm sorry they made a bad choice in paramedics. It proves  my point we need local volunteers, Dolan and Meadview  is culture shock to outsiders. In the middle of nowhere, what do you mean they haul water?


The issue is NOT any imagined “NACFD policy against volunteers”.  It is (1) the lack of volunteers in our area stepping up, and (2) a lack of commitment by volunteers who do step up.  This is the reality of the area in which we live.  We do not have the quality or quantity of volunteers that some other areas of the country have.  To survive, we must work within that reality.  To COUNT on volunteers for any plan going forward is suicide!  To survive we must maintain a stable base of paid personnel and management which NACFD has already established and which consolidation would continue to provide.  From that stable base we can then train and utilize volunteers as they step up, and as their qualifications allow, for such things as recruiting more volunteers, pursuing annexation of Meadview’s $265,000 potential tax base into the District, organizing regular trainings for firefighters & EMS personnel, and community outreach projects, etc.

Not COUNTING on volunteers  could mean your death if no one shows up, or an ambulance or fire truck with one person. If you want the calls where one person shows up, left me know.

The ongoing disinformation being propagated by the focus group to undermine the consolidation effort brings into question their sincerity in their claim to be “neutral, with no agenda”.  Obviously not true!

Don't listen to me, do your homework, look up  fire department staffing lawsuits. Look up your chance of survival with an ambulance 45 minutes to who knows when.

Without volunteers we're in trouble.. When people know we have one ambulance sometimes, how many will visit or move here? 

NACFD Board Meeting October 15th

The NACFD board meeting is October 15th at 6pm at 2486 Northern Ave in Kingman.

This is our last chance to tell the NACFD board we don't want consolidation.

The LMRFD can't provide fire and EMS services without volunteers, and I don't trust we will ever have volunteers if we consolidate.

How could it possibly be worse than having one firefighter show up on the ambulance, or the fire truck.

Look at NACFD history of dropping volunteers.

Two EMT'S Can't Manage A Heart Attack and Do CPR

To manage a heart attack, or run a code while doing CPR you need at least 4 people. One to drive, one to watch the monitor, and two to do CPR.

The only way for two EMT's to run a code, is using a machine called a thumper, or mechanical CPR device.

At the Town Hall meeting I asked if the LMRFD had a thumper or mechanical CPR device. We were told they don't have a thumper. We were also told the thumper was old technology.

It's not only NOT old technology, according to the Journal of Emergency Medicine, mechanical CPR devices provide far better CPR than manual CPR.

Mechanical CPR Article

Mechanical CPR delivers more effective CPR because it doesn't get tired, and always delivers the correct rate, depth, and placement.

This is something LMRFD needs. I doubt anyone who left Dolan Springs or Meadview with CPR in progress ever left the hospital. In Seattle 57% of sudden cardiac arrest patient survive, the national average is 8-10%.

We need to teach everyone CPR.

Town Hall Meeting October 6th Don't Miss

Please Don't Miss the Town Hall Meeting October 6th at the Dolan Springs Community Center at 6 pm.

It our fire district, and without volunteers I think we're in trouble. We need to start recruiting volunteers from all the area çoveresd by the ambulance CON, not just the fire district.

We have good people in Dolan Springs, over West of the highway, in Meadview, and White Hills, we need those folks to come give us a hand. It's not their fire district, but it is their ambulance.

Building an effective EMS system will be a challenge, but saving lives in the street, or in or in the hospital it's always a challenge.

In the near future we hope to have enough volunteers to allow our EMT's to respond from their home, directly to the patient's home, allowing them to assess the patient, and package them  for transport, reducing response times and patient survivability.

Eventually starting a Community-Paramedicine program. Something new in Arizona where paramedics do more primary care as opposed to only emergency response.

Our paramedics would be allowed to be more proactive, than reactivate to chronic medical conditions.

Please come to the meeting October 6th at the Community Center, learn about our options.

Jay

Many rural fire districts field a significant volunteer force, which yields a high degree of cost effectiveness for fire suppression and emergency services.

The paragraph below is from the Arizona Fire District Association.

Many rural fire districts field a significant volunteer force, which yields a high degree of cost effectiveness for fire suppression and emergency services. They fill a need that otherwise cannot be generally provided by another governmental entity.

It's obvious to most Dolan Springs and Meadview need volunteers. It's how we motivate and retain volunteers that will make or break a volunteer program.

To me training volunteers to the level they're comfortable with makes sense. Why force someone who would be great at driving the ambulance, to take hundreds of hours of training to be a firefighter or EMT, they have no interest in, and won't do well at?

We need volunteers but to keep volunteers invested, you need to use them. We need CERT people trained to handle traffic. Like at the church fires, I directed traffic until my flashlight went dead.

Someone needs to support the firefighters on any working fire. When it's 105 degrees, you can't work long in bunkers. We need CERT to do things like setup a cooling station, make sure they have cold water, and don't go down from heat stroke.

We need to come together as a community, show people Dolan Springs does care and volunteer. The other choice is the way we are, because consolation won't change that.

We need people who are willing to volunteer as an Ambulance Attendant, no EMT or paramedic, just take an emergency vehicle operations course to be able to drive the ambulance.

ARS 36-2201 #6 (b) An emergency medical responder who is employed by an ambulance service operating under section 36-2202 and whose primary responsibility is the driving of an ambulance.

We need others interested in being an EMT Basic and advancing to EMT Advanced. This would give anyone a big hand up on their way to being an RN, nurse practitioner, physicians assistant, or even a physician.

When an RN gets out of school, they know little more than book knowledge. When a paramedic gets out of RN school, they're an experienced critical care RN paramedic with a career, and service to their community.

If you want to volunteer for CERT Training, as a volunteer firefighter, or for the ambulance, let someone know.

Or stick our heads back in the desert sand.....