For those who think that PSPRS and its members are being picked on by The Arizona Republic, check out this August 8, 2013 article, Mission Creep at the L.A. Fire Department, by Hillel Aron of LA Weekly. For those not familiar with LA Weekly, it is the Los Angeles weekly that follows the same editorial (progressive) and business model (food/entertainment advertising) as Phoenix New Times and Tucson Weekly; LA Weekly and Phoenix New Times are both owned by Voice Media Group, whose flagship paper is New York City's The Village Voice. These papers all pride themselves on their investigative reporting, coverage of stories ignored by other local media outlets, and bare-knuckle commentary on local politics, as well as being the arbiters of all that is cool and hip in their respective communities.
Mr. Aron's article is interesting because it starts out as the standard article chronicling the burdensome medical call load of the Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD). However, the reader who sticks with the article will find that the article is about much more than that. It details Los Angeles' diminished fire call load, its recent scandal of reporting fictitious response-time data, and the misalignment between LAFD's current resources, both human and equipment, and the community's needs.
However, the most surprising aspect of the article is its unfavorable comparison between LAFD and the Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACoFD). LACoFD is held up as a model of efficiency compared to LAFD. And one of the principal reasons for this is the County's use of private ambulance services, instead of using more costly LACoFD personnel to transport patients. So we have the premier local progressive media source in Los Angeles actually praising the outsourcing of a government service. Now that's interesting.
The true impact of this for anyone in fire and EMS is that if you eliminate even a small portion of the medical call load, you eliminate the need for a corresponding number of fire and EMS personnel. When a progressive can employ the words "outsource" or "privatize" without sarcasm or vitriol, it may be time for some of us to worry.
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