Id Badge

[lilyogi]

Has anyone done the ID badges for your staff yet? The new law goes into effect JAN. 1st and I am in the process of doing our dept and was wondering if anyone else has done it yet. LAter Lilyogi.

[firenresq77]

Yogi, what's the law for? Just curious what they are requiring and why.......


I made ours using Word Perfect. I make the IDs using the business card maker. The Wordperfect is nice because you can do multiple ones on one sheet. I tried using a couple other programs, but you had to do each one individually or do a whole sheet of the same one.

Ours are basic. FD name and address, Picture, Your name, Rank, and ID number and signature on the front (with a watermark of our patch in the background).

On the back is blanks for Height, Weight, Sex, Hair color, Eye color, and Birthdate, along with the City's "official" wording and the Fire Chief's signature. We do 2 for each person. 1 for the wallet and another with the clip on it to clip on your clothing........

[k3twpfire]

Any firefighter using a blue light will have to have a letter or identification card stating that he or she is a member of a fire department, rescue squad, et. al.

[firenresq77]

Ahhhhhhhh. I see... Nothing was required before?

[ChiefReason]

Before the new law was passed, you were required to have a letter from the fire district. It was basically ignored. The logic was that no cop would be foolish enough to stop a firefighter who was enroute to an incident.
Since just about anyone can obtain a badge from any number of sources, it was decided that an ID would be "more secure".
I have had an ID for over 10 years. Never had a problem.
It's funny; we expand the use of the color blue in flashing lights, then come back and say "oops; how will we know who's who?"
Typical.
CR

[jboczek]

Since somebody brought it up, has anybody heard anything about the state issued IDs? I remember about a year ago that the state was starting to issue all of IDs and they were starting with the bigger depts. and working their way around. Anybody know anything?

[80FIRE]

Our local telephone coop made our ID cards for us free of charge. Hard plastic like their employees use.

Jack....The state is in the process of issuing ID cards. They are working to get credentials for all the special teams first. (Haz-Mat, TRT, etc) Then they plan to issue ID's to all FF after that. Acording to the last info I saw it will be quite some time before this happens for most of us.I am not sure that funding has even been found to make all of this happen yet.

[jaybird210]

I've been kicking this around ever since the local police chief gave me the heads-up.

Actually, I like Brian's idea of churing something out in WordPerfect. I've been on the fence to buy our own laminating equipment, or just get the local bank to do it for us. Laminators and supplies would run around $200.

Probably something we should have been doing for years.....

[firenresq77]

Jay, I'm not sure how much our laminator cost, but it couldn't have been much. Nothing fancy...... Just a small office type one. We went to Office Max and bought the plastic for the wallet ones and another couple packages of the ones for the clip-ons..... Those already have the hole in them and come with the clips. Pretty cheap way of doing IDs for those who still need them......

[jboczek]

Go to www.idville.com and see what they've got. Looks like we can get what we want for about .65 apiece and only have to buy 50 of them. It's about the cheapest place I've found to get badge holders, etc. We're going to use business cards and probably a vertical holder w/ a clip. We've got some laminating sheets to use for a wallet card. Works pretty good for something really cheap.

[jboczek]

Here's what OSFM is suggesting the ID cards should contain. This comes from their legal counsel.

As for the I.D. Card, you can inform your trustees that it is required
by law pursuant to Public Act 93-725 and effective January 1, 2005. At
minimum the card should contain the following information:

1. Name of the Department
2. Name of the Member
3. Rank of the Member [ie: firefighter, engineer, lieutenant, Captain,
Chief, etc.]
4. Member's Term of Service. [ie: Member Since January 1991]
5. Fire Department contact information (which I suggest you put on the
back of the card and include the department name, address, & telephone
number and name of the Chief).

A photo is optional and I suggest a you issue a new card every 2 years.
The State ID is a federal matter and still under consideration.

[kprsn1]

I've got a rough draft of ours done. Just did it on Microsoft Word (probably going to put the member's picture on as well using a digital camera). Going to print them, cut them out, and laminate them with the self laminating sheets that don't need heat. They've got all the info and since they won't get used much and will be relpaced probably yearly here, we won't be spending much more than the cost of the lam sheets and some good paper if not photo paper.

Chad

[jaybird210]

Avery Labels has a laminated ID card form. Stock #5361; we bought 30 sheets (3 cards x 10 pages) for roughly $17.00 (less than 60¢ each). Ran 'em through the ink jet printer, with a digital picture, and viola, ID cards.