Rural?metro

[engmed21]

I took a few minutes to look over the article about the Rural/Metro situation. I can definately feel for these brothers, as I am also working for a private company in Illinois and have a similiar situation. The company that I work for provides contract paramedics, and FF/PM. Although the company treats us very well, we still don't have the typical benefits that full-time department are getting. Not only that but we are looked upon as "scabs" for doing a union job and are alot of times treated as less than human because we don't have a "full-time" position somewhere. Unfortunately Illinois is saturated with paramedics and firefighters, and unless you work as a full-timer someplace or as a volunteer , state law doesn't provide for preference points for being hired on a department. There are people out there that want the job because it's what they love to do, and there are those that have know experience or love for the job, but want the paycheck and the benefits that come with it. Not that that's bad in some peoples eyes. Now that I've gone off on a tangent. I just want to finish with this: There are alot of us that understand and support our brothers in Arizona.

[Glenn_Boothe]

engmed21, thanx for your kind words. I certainly understand what youre going through, it wasnt a few years agao that we were getting the cold shoulder, and things have definately improved since we organized (Maricopa County), but every once in a while we run into a engine company or two from surrounding departments that still seem to genuinely WANT to be difficult. Nevertheless, for the record, we read the article at our station and couldnt help but get the feeling that the article made all of us seem like geriatrics or something, maybe it's our interpretation but that was just our intial response when we read it.

Hopefully our department and our union executive board will come to terms with something in the near future in relation to benefits, better yet, I sincerely hope that the guys that have been on 15+ to 20 years can receive somekind of deal to where they can retire. Will it happen? Can it happen? Thats opening up a can of worms that can et sticky! But the bottom line is that it ought to open.

Im still young so I still have a few years to go before it starts affecting me, but I really hope I dont get put into that boat the older guys are currently in!

Take care

Glenn