How do they do that?

[remya]

In the province of Ontario who is responsible for dictating a fire departments running area? Is it left up to the individual municipalities to hammer out the best and safest running areas for the public or does everyone just stop at each town/township/city line? ...as we do.

[Rescue78]

Remya

In Ontario, the departments respond within the municipality they belong to. However, municipalities can enter mutual aid agreements in case of incidents that go beyound their resources.

A city is not obligated to have a fire departement. They can basically rent the services of a neighbor municipality.

[pitter19]

As stated in another reply, many communities have mutual aid agreements. In Hamilton (former Waterdown) an area called carlilse has dual response from Hamilton Volunteers and Burlington Volunteers. The cities have called this Auto Aid. The idea is that Carlilse is almost exactly the same distance away from both Hamilton Fire , and Burlington Fire so they send both stations to all alarms. This is a way of trying to offer the best response to a remote community with very few alarms.

With talking to many Firefighters from other communities it seems that many old response borders are being changed to offer better response. Sometimes the borders have changed due to insurance investigations, finding that another communities fire service was closer than that of the municipality in which the emergency occured.

[remya]

Thanks for your responses.

I was sort of venting (negative pressure) and wanted to know who could/would decide that a hall that is a mere stones throw from a 400 series highway is not to cover that highway but instead a hall from approximately 10 kms away that posses little to no heavy Hydraulics (as we have).

It just boggles my mind that some areas are not properly protected due to politics. Drive carefully!!

[Michael13]

Thats it. It's all politics. A municipality must make agreements with other municipalites for fire pretection. That happens alot with coverage where the furthest department, or unquailified department repsonds rather than the one that makes sence. We have agreements with the departments in out county to cover for mutual aid. We have a command centre trailer, and if a department 40 km away needed we would respond. I do believe even if the incident was large enough we would respond 50kms. You do what you need to do to help out fellow departments. We area border department and one our west side is a different municipality. They just told us, they will no longer help us with mutial aid for free. It will cost us now, if we require their assistance. They will still help, but at about $2000 an hour. We also have a large retirement home on our northern boundary, and another department is 2 mins away, while we are at least 15. If its a confirmed fire, IC will ask for them , but they are not dispatched first. The 400 series highways do present a problem. No one likes to cover the, but most Depts will. Someday I would like to see a 400 series dept covering itself. In reality a station could be kept every 30 - 40 kms and still have the a better response time than us. And they would be fully trained and equiped for auto ex. One truck per hall, would probably do it. But thats a huge amount of money for taxpayers. The highway would probably have to go to toll road, and charge money for its use. This has been brought up before through the ON. government before, and turned down I beleive. It would most likely draw more traffic through our rural communties from drivers attempting to avoid paying money. It would cause too many problems. For now we will continue to cover 400 highway, but we dont like doing it. If your department doesnt cover a major highway, consider yourself lucky. In your case Remya, its too bad, since you dont have the equipment and the closet department does. have your council keep at them and try to come up with an agreement. it might cost money. but something can most likey be worked out.

[remya]

Sorry Michael13. I may not have been to clear. I'm speaking from the hall that is closest and has the equipment.

To top this rant off the heavy hydraulics for this other hall has to come from a hall 40+ kms away.

[Michael13]

Ok, I get ya now. So would you, or your members be willing to cover the highway? You might be wishing you didnt when and if you start covering that highway.

[remya]

We can hear their calls being paged (on open channel) out and some of us will head to our hall just in case it is in our area or if they need our hydraulics (if they mutual aid use, usually we have to watch them drive by our hall on the way to the call ).

So yes we would be willing if we were allowed. We had covered this stretch of highway for 50+ years until amalgamation in 1994. We are all here for the same reason...to help others, but unfortunately someone is going to have to lose there life before this is seriously looked at.

[Leafs Fan]

Just to put the 400 series highways into some political perspective. In Ontario the Ministry of transportation pays volunteer fire dept's to respond to all provincial highways by the hour and by the vehicle. That is a huge cash cow for a small rural dept. Is it any wonder they will not give it up, money trumps common sense and safety again.

[Michael13]

Yes M of Transportation pays for calls. But last year 85% of our calls to 401 were non service calls. We only had 2 fires, and 3 calls requring auto ex. The rest of the time we only do a drive by because- either the car or vehicle is bogus and cant be found, or its a simple run of the icy road and all the person needs is a tow truck. These non service calls only pay $300. That doesnt even cover our our wages.

[Leafs Fan]

Originally posted by Michael13
Yes M of Transportation pays for calls. But last year 85% of our calls to 401 were non service calls. We only had 2 fires, and 3 calls requring auto ex. The rest of the time we only do a drive by because- either the car or vehicle is bogus and cant be found, or its a simple run of the icy road and all the person needs is a tow truck. These non service calls only pay $300. That doesnt even cover our our wages.

you are one well paid volunteer FD, Micheal. if it is just a simple drive by it should take about half an hour in service, if 10 of you go ( which seems extreme for a minor call) thats 60 bucks each.
What I am getting at is , your dept doesn't get any funds for your regular house fires, grass fires etc. that you respond to in your municipality, but 401 calls are self funding and are a money maker. It is all in how your chief bills the MTO. If you send a pump and a rescue even for a what turns out to be a bogus call they can bill for $300 dollars per vehicle and if it lasts over an hour it drops to 150 bucks a vehicle every half hour after that. I know the volunteer Dept where I live bought their new rescue van from an equipment reserve fund made from 401 calls alone. So you see that is why in Ontario, Volunteer dept's in Ontario are reluctant to give up highway responses.

[Michael13]

Half an hour? Well thats cutting it close. By the time we drive all the way to the next turn off, and we only driving 30 - 40 cuz the roads are snow covered, and get back to the hall, and wash the terrible salf off 3 trucks, its been an hour. And we have an excellent turn out for guys, so we never get 10, our overall average on all call last yeat was 17. So 17 x 25 $ = 425. Per vehicle 300?? I I'm not to sure if we are charging 300 per vehicle. I would have to check. And yes our council spoils us for pay. Most vollies still loose money when being a FF, were arn't there for the money. Gas, time loss (work and family), wear and tear on vehicle all cost money too. I bet I break even.

[remya]

Point taken Leafs Fan. I had forgotten about the MTO money. I can now see why it has stayed this way, even with the potential for loss of life.

The only thing I have to add is that on several occasions we have let it be know that they could mutual aid us at any time (not that they need our halls permission) and not once have they done so for a MVC.