Here are some interesting numbers:
Pierce 105’ Quint aerial - $961,438.74 fully equipped
Pierce 75’ Quint aerial - $881,893.20 fully equipped
Pierce Engine - $606,514.33 fully equipped (This includes approx. $40,000+ for CAFS +18” more wheelbase on the engine)
105' Quint costs $354,924.41 more than the engine.
75’ Quint costs $275,378.87 more than the engine.
The interesting thing is the department's stance is to keep working with the Quint concept and the dual fleet. At this point the department is planning on buying both 20 quints and 20 engines.
Assuming today’s prices this means the total cost of replacement:
(4) 105’ Quints: $3,845,754.96
(14) 75’ Quints: $12,346,504.80
(20) Engines: $12,130,286.60
Total for a dual fleet over several years: $28,322,546.36 * ** ***
(*Prices do not include Quint 5 or Quint 13 because they are platforms and we have no data on what will occur with those trucks. However if they are replaced with two more towers, add another two to three million dollars to this estimate.)
(**Prices do not include three heavy rescue trucks)
(*** Prices do not include the rescue pumper experiment…man, this is getting expensive)
The reasons for the dual fleet system has been numerous. First the remaining old engines were to be used as reserves for the new quints which were purchased. Second we were supposed to take them on EMS calls to help reduce the wear and tear of the Quints from all the runs those heavy trucks were responding to. But anyway you look at it, you have a 500,000 dollar to 1,000,000 dollar piece of equipment with no one to staff it when the main truck is on a call.
Let’s look at Henrico for a comparison of traditional system response versus a total quint concept. Henrico is running 20 engines, 5 trucks and 3 specialty rescues. They do this in a county that is 238 square miles versus the 60 square miles of Richmond.
If we apply the traditional model to Richmond, and even assume we kept 5 truck companies as Quints, we would see this:
(5) 105’ Quints: $4,807,193.70
(20) Engines: $12,130,286.60
Total: $16,937,479.70
A savings of $11,385,066.66
As a tax paying citizen of Richmond I would like to ask “is this is a good decision especially in these tough economic times?”
All the numbers make my brain want to explode. That would be too easy. It would take 5 years to implement. Who would head it up? Tracy would want her fingers in it. If it isn't her idea it would never work.
ReplyDeleteHave you bumped your head.
Drink the Kool Aid!
I am not actually a fire fighter but I do live in the City. I commend the firefighters for taking an active role in making our City better. I have read through your site and this topic is very interesting. I bring my children to the local fire house all the time and have often wondered about the 2 trucks. What I didn't think about was how much one of those trucks cost. I am not a professional in the field of mathematics, however I do have some common sense. How does the City get off purchasing 2 trucks for one group of people? These things cost more than twice what my house costs. Why are they called Quints? Who actually makes the decision to buy all of these trucks? Please know that you may not always feel appreciated by your employer but your community depends on you. A special thank you to those of you who spent the holidays away from your families keeping us safe.
ReplyDelete-concerned citizen
Chesterfield: 21 engines, 5 trucks. Over 400 square miles
ReplyDeleteThese numbers are ridiculous and show clearly how out of touch the fire dept. administration is with reality. However, you can not compare Richmond with Chesterfield or Henrico. Other than sharing some borders with them, we have nothing in common. You need to compare Richmond to other CITIES such as Washington, Baltimore, Charleston, Memphis, Philadelphia, etc. Places with a true urban environment that includes the population density, building construction, fire load, and other aspects that do not come into play with suburban departments such as our neighbors.
ReplyDeleteHello, I am not a firefighter myself, however I am a citizen and resident of the City of Richmond. I have all ways been concerned about those huge ladder trucks, quints I guess they are called, because I have noticed how tight our streets are, with parking, and one way streets...... Its no question that I see fire trucks, going on calls or at calls in the city all the time, and I am curious as to how you all get those huge ladder trucks down our tight, and crowded streets. Not to mention fuel costs, and maintenance. To me it would make more sense to have lots of smaller trucks, and a few big trucks like the metro areas. I would like to think that my tax dollars are used in the most efficient manner to serve the citizens. Maybe this needs to be brought to the attention of the city council. Thank you all for what you do.....
ReplyDeleteDear Concerned Citizen:
ReplyDeleteYour response is why most of us are on the job. Feeling appreciated by those that you try to protect is a feeling that's very hard to describe. You didn't give me a gift or money, you just said thanks. That's all that matters. I have no idea who you are, but honestly I got a little choked up just reading your post.
I'll try to answer some of your questions.
Why are they called Quints?
They are called Quints because they are "supposed to" accomplish 5 functions of a fire truck. They have an aerial ladder, hose, water tank, ground ladders, and a pump. Most fire departments across the country accomplish these 5 tasks by using two types of trucks...engines and ladders, which are staffed by 4 persons each. A normal dept. has 1 ladder truck for every 3-4 engines. So, the engines do most of the "meat and potatoes" calls with a very capable, lighter vehicle. Then ladder trucks are called in to assist with structure fires, car wrecks, technical rescues, and other assorted duties.
This "Quint concept" looks good on paper, but it doesn't really add up where the rubber meets the road. The Quint is OK at doing these 5 functions, but not great at any of them. For some reason, even though many departments have tried Quints for years, we think we've got it all figured out. We think the "Quint Concept" works. We are forced to try to be a jack of all trades, and we end up not doing anything great, just like the truck itself.
How does the City get off purchasing 2 trucks for one group of people?
Well, when you have a giant 70,000 pound ladder truck in every fire house, it's hard to justify taking it on EMS calls, car fires, etc. Quints were not meant to be in an urban environment. They were meant to be used by suburban depts. that are short staffed, or have few apparatus. So, we decided to have FRVs to respond to EMS calls, etc. where a Quint was not needed. That also leaves close to a 1 million dollar truck in the station, with no one on it. These smaller trucks don't have near the capability of a Quint, or a Class A pumper for that matter. So, we take those on EMS calls to ease the wear and tear on the big Quint. We end up having 2 trucks per house, when we could do it with a smaller, but capable Telesqurt, or Class A pumper at a fraction of the cost.So, we end up paying for tires, fans, SCBAs, fuel, oil, hooks, AEDs, hose, nozzles, ladders,etc. TWICE for each firehouse. Also, in someone's pipe dream, if we ever had to call back an entire shift to staff stations, we would have enough trucks to put the firefighters on. If we didn't staff all of our trucks during the Broad St. Fire,or Gaston,or Isabel, or Irene when the hell would we? We are a busy, aggressive urban department. We need every member that we have, we just need a better apparatus model in which to deploy them.
Who actually makes the decision to buy all of these trucks?
If we only knew...
To whom it may concern....
ReplyDeleteCity of Richmond Current.
1) 20 Fire stations
2) 20 Quints (Ladder Trucks) (Staffing 4 FF's per quint = 80)
4) 3 Heavy Rescue Units ( Staffing 5 FF's per unit = 15)
5) 4 Battalion Chief units (Staffing 1 Chief per unit = 4)
6) 1 safety officer (Staffing 1 Lt per unit = 1)
7) 1 Air/Light/Utility unit (Staffing 1 FF = 1)
8) Grand total = 101 minimum staffing....
Would this work????
1) 20 FIre stations
2) 20 Dedicated Engine Companies (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 80)
3) 5 Dedicated truck companies (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 20)
4) 2 Heavy rescue units 1 north 1 south. (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 8)
5) 4 Battalion Chief units (Staffing 1 Chief per unit = 4)
6) 1 safety officer (Staffing 1 Lt per unit = 1)
7) 1 Air/Light/Utility unit (Staffing 1 FF = 1)
8) Grand total = 114 minimum staffing ( Extra 13 positions)
With the second model if you are worried about the number of ladders available, then some of the engine companies could run 75" light weight aluminum ladders, single axle, similar to what 21, and 22 have been assigned. Therefore you will have more ladders available for arial ops, for big Broad street fires that happen every year.
How much of that 11 million dollars give or take.... would help with 13 extra positions to staff the traditional model? Does anyone know or can come up with some type of numbers to compare, with salary etc.
Has the City Auditor been made aware of this waste of taxpayer dollars? How about the Newspaper and TV stations? How much longer can Chief Creecy get away with the lies he and his staff of "Yes Chief" robots is telling to the City Administration?
ReplyDeleteI do find this very interesting. I am an Officer in the Henrico County Fire Department, as well as a citizen of the City of Richmond. Some of the guys told me about this blog and I thought I would check it out. These points about apparatus are interesting to me, and having over 20 years in the fire service, I have always wondered how effective, or confusing the Quint concept must be to you all. If I remember correctly, the Quint concept was brought about as an alternative to re-hiring the mass exodus you guys had years back in retirements. I may be wrong about this, so please feel free to put me in my place. I believe that the concept was that the Quints over time would save money versus hiring people to replace the retirees because this would eliminate salaries, leave, overtime, sick leave, insurance, retirement ect... I wonder if this still holds true? I am not advocating the Quint concept, as most of my friends in the RFD are not fond of it, and my entire career both here and in prior departments consisted of traditional Engine / Truck / Rescue framework. I have never experienced the Quint concept, but in the case of the city of Richmond having probably allocated money to re-hire firefighters to go back to a traditional system to other budgetary needs, is it even possible to go back to a traditional system and hire the staffing to do it? Is the plan to start to hire firefighters to slowly get back to the traditional system? It’s confusing to me to buy all of these new Quints and ALSO purchase NEW engines to keep the Quints from getting worn out when you guys have to choose one or the other standing in the middle of the bay because you don’t have enough staffing to run them both. I guess the breakdown has to come in long term investment and expense for say 12 new firefighters versus the long term expense and investment of one Quint. I agree you could just buy engines, save a lot of money, and have a massive ladder truck reserve fleet to rotate through to make the Quints last longer and hire some people to staff the additional units. You could probably sell half of those Quints and recoup some of that expense. Does anyone know the long term plan? This may be something that takes time to move back to. I remember when I was a kid, I grew up in 24’s district, which I think was Engine 24 and Truck 9…. I think. Anyway, my mom set our kitchen on fire and I still remember that ladder truck. I think I was maybe 12ish…. I think it was a Maxim. Anyway, sorry you guys are dealing with the growing pains of getting back to traditional. There are certainly problems everywhere you go. Keep in mind that the average citizen in the City of Richmond has no understanding of any of this material, and wouldn’t know right from wrong if you threw it at them regarding fire trucks, so for a citizen to fight this kind of thing budget wise, they would have to be educated on it. If you guys got some hard numbers I think it’s a no brainer both budget wise, and quality of service. I would like to say though that in all of my dealings with your department (and I have had a few), you guys (and Girls) have always been professional and met my expectations as a citizen.
ReplyDeleteThe Total Quint Concept That McElfish sold the City was not because of a mass exodus of people leaving. It was sold as a way to eliminate 50 (approx) positions. Over, I think it was, he claimed something like a 30 million dollar savings in salaries. Something like 16 million dollars, (someone may need to correct this figure)was spent on Quints and FRV's. Maintenance was to be non existent. Maintenance has sky rocketed into the zillions of dollars.
ReplyDeleteAny way, long story short, if you spend 35 million dollars I can save you 30 million dollars.
These quints can do the same as an engine and a ladder truck (TRUCK) the city leaders were told. Never were they told that they only could do either one or the other, not both at once.
The entire city was, and still is being shafted.
Are the citizens in jeopardy? Who knows.
For what it's worth, the only other department in the US that was running the total quint concept (TQC), St Louis, has abandoned the idea, and has gone back to a traditional engine/truck concept. They'll have a standard amount of engines, and they're refurbishing many of the older 75' quints they had that will run as ladder companies, and then they'll also have a handful of 100'+ aerials throughout the city.
ReplyDeleteThis is not true.... St. Louis runs a TQC still to this day... Don't believe me check the web site they are really happy about the two new 105 foot Quints that they call Hook and Ladders.
DeleteSt. Louis FD runs 36 vehicles, 34 Quints and 2 HD Rescues. From 30 fire houses. 30 of the quints call themselves eninges, 4 of the quints call themselves H&L. The engine as they call them in the STL are quints. in our worlthree are 75 foot quints or smaller and look like our new 75's. Engines do engine work and if they need it they put up the stick. The 4 hook and ladders assigned to a house that also has an engine (75' quint) are 100 plus foot quints. When the H&L respond they only do truck work. So when a house fire comes in... 3 engines, 1 H&L, respond but all of them are quints. Pull up YouTube and type in St.louis fire... This department is currently and will be buying quints and calling them engine and Hook and Ladder. They were doing it in the 80's and have made it work because this is the hand they were delt. We could do the same thing but we are busy telling people we are the only one's that do it..... Wake up Richmond. We are not alone we are just the only ones that are unable to make it work.
In your first sentence you say that St Lou runs the TQC....then you go on to describe how they run 30 quints as strictly engines and four as hook and ladders that respond out of a station that houses an engine (2 company house) and they do truck work only. This is NOT a TQC. A TQC is a system where every company gets a quint and they provide dual functions based upon the dispatch. WAKE up moron!! We are alone. Truth be told, RFD doesn't truly run a TQC because of the dual fleet and FRV's. Bottom line is that the current system is a huge waste of taxpayers money and we are not talking pocket change.......we are talking Millions!!
DeleteA couple thoughts for Kool Aid Salesman's response. By Mass exodus I meant retirements. I thought they wanted to eliminate 50 positions because 50 plus people retired at once. I was always told growing up in the city that they had a massive hiring in the 70's, and then they all went at once. Mcelfish sold the idea because they didnt have to fill those retirees slots. I didnt mean to imply 50 people quit. On the issue of the citizens being in jeopardy, after looking over this site, I have two thoughts. One is that I am not familiar with how you guys do this, but if you have to set your gear in the middle of the bay because you have to choose between a quint or an FRV based on the call type, response times have to suffer. I have friends at 14 in Chesterfield that deal with that same issue between the Heavy Rescue and the ladder truck, and they hate it. Second, while I am definitely careful about excessive dependence on a TIC (They came later in my career), they certainly have their place, and they certainly have the potential to help in a search. I can not imagine, if this is actually true, allocating budget money to install the ZOLL system BEFORE placing TICS on all of the units. This seems especially harmfull in a quint world because you never really know what you are going to be responding as (Engine / Truck) Right? If response times suffer and life saving tools such as TICS are passed over for ZOLL systems, I would say that puts the citizens in greater jeapordy. How many people do you guys kill every year with erratic driving versus people you find in a house fire that may have been found quicker with the assistance of a Thermal Imaging Camera??
ReplyDeleteI agree with everything that has been said in this post, but i need to just make some small corrections and a couple suggestions
ReplyDelete1. St Louis did and still runs what is now called a modified quint concept, they have always called their quints engine companies and the 105 quints and towers where called hook and ladder companies (still quints ).now they gone back to some traditional engines and still run 75'quints at some houses (as engines) and all the 105's and towers are called Trucks or Hook and Ladders,
2.Syracuse and Fort Worth both tried the quint concept and have abandoned it to go to the modified concept.
3. I am a firm believer in quints but used in the right place and area's, i would like to see us accept change and go to a modified quint concept which would be very similar to the model 2 above with the exception of these couple of small changes
20 Engines Companies
(E-5,E-6,E-1,E-12,E-14,E-17,E-18,E-20,E-23,E-25)then these would be quints but still run as engine companies with light weight ladders and single axle or squirts (E-11,E-8,E-10,E-13,E-15,E-16,E-19,E-21,E-22,E-24)
5 Trucks
T-1,T-13,T-14,T-18,T-24
2 Rescues
R-10, R-20
just my random thoughts but i think none of this will ever fly under the current administration (they would take 4 years to analyze it even if Fitch and Assoc. recommended it today )
Anonymous:
ReplyDeleteWould this work????
1) 20 FIre stations
2) 20 Dedicated Engine Companies (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 80)
3) 5 Dedicated truck companies (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 20)
4) 2 Heavy rescue units 1 north 1 south. (Staffing 4 FF's per unit = 8)
5) 4 Battalion Chief units (Staffing 1 Chief per unit = 4)
6) 1 safety officer (Staffing 1 Lt per unit = 1)
7) 1 Air/Light/Utility unit (Staffing 1 FF = 1)
8) Grand total = 114 minimum staffing ( Extra 13 positions)
3 SHIFTS = 39 POSITIONS
The TQC came about because the city manager told McElfish to cut positions in the department. He tried to fight him to keep from loosing the engines and trucks. The manager told him to CUT positions. The manager told him, if he didn't, he would fire him and hire a chief that would do as he required.
ReplyDeleteThe department had the members to run the engines and truck, with some vacanices which the city coud hire and fill them. The city manager won out, and he left after the cuts were made.
39 positions @ $55,000 each (salary+benefits, estimated) = $2,145,000 per year. Just food for thought.
ReplyDeleteFleet maintenance costs:
ReplyDelete20 Quints
-Annual average maintenance
$753,044 per year
-Twelve year maintenance cost up to FY10
$6,020,820
20 Engines (new engine 14 replaced by OOS KME to keep figures accurate)
-Annual average maintenance
$255,847 per year
-Twelve year maintenance cost up to FY10
$2,006,970
**Quints have cost an average of $497,197/year more to maintain than engines
***Quints have cost exactly $4,013,850 more over 12 years to maintain than engines
-Total maintenance from purchase till FY10:
$9,327,528 (keep in mind maintenance costs will only increase in years to come)
+
$28,322,546.36 (Approx. cost of current fleet replacement plan)
=
$37,650,074.36
Why is it that the "Quint Concept" has not swept the nation by storm?
ReplyDeleteThe Council and the citizens were warned of these vehicles. I remember Lt. Pulliam fighting it. I remember another Lieutenant who talked till he was blue in the face, nobody listened to him. In fact he wrote an article in a well respected magazine about the true problems of Quints. I can't remember what happened to him.
ReplyDelete