Courtesy of
International Association of Fire Fighters
The President of the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) applauded President Bush’s plan to allocate $3.5 billion to train and equip fire fighters and other first responders. But, he noted that the plan fails to address critical staffing shortages at fire departments across the nation.
The quarter-million professional fire fighters and paramedics of the IAFF protect 80 percent of the nation’s population. The thousands of fire fighters who responded to the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11 were IAFF members. IAFF General President Harold A. Schaitberger made the following statement:
The nation’s fire fighters applaud President Bush’s Homeland Security package as a significant step toward training and equipping local fire fighters and law enforcement officers to handle their critical role as the first responders to acts of terrorism on American soil.
However, we are very concerned that the package fails to address the serious staffing shortages that exist in two-thirds of the nation’s fire departments. All the training, equipment, and planning in the world won’t help if we don’t have an adequate number of fire fighters to respond to a terrorist incident.
We also believe safeguards must be taken to insure that the money gets to local fire and police agencies where it is needed most. Too often, funds from well-intentioned federal programs are siphoned off before they ever get into the hands of local agencies.
As we saw so vividly on September 11, fire fighters are our nation’s first responders to terrorist attacks. And, as we saw that day, they are prepared to put the lives of others ahead of their own.
Unfortunately, the nation’s fire fighters are woefully unprepared to provide an effective and safe response to attacks against Americans involving weapons of mass destruction, whether they involve chemical, biological, or nuclear agents. Yet, fire fighters will respond to such incidents in 4 or 5 minutes, as compared to the 4 or 5 hours it could take for the specialized military teams to reach the scene.
We have been working with Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge and his staff on this critical issue, and we have full confidence in his commitment to preparing fire fighters and police to fulfill their mission as the nation’s domestic defenders against terrorist attacks.
To support this package and stress the importance of adequate funding for first responders, nearly 1,000 fire fighters, including veterans of Ground Zero, will come to Washington, D.C. in March to take their concerns to Congress.
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