September 2, 2010 -- Liberty Mutual and the IAFF Financial Corporation (IAFF-FC) are actively preparing for the potential arrival of Hurricane Earl. Your safety is the utmost priority, so please make sure that you, your members and their families stay up to date on the latest hurricane information available, and are following all evacuation announcements issued for your area.
August 27, 2010 -- Fire departments around the nation are cutting jobs, closing firehouses and increasingly resorting to “rolling brownouts” in which they shut different fire companies on different days as the economic downturn forces many cities and towns to make deep cuts that are slowing their responses to fires and other emergencies.
August 26, 2010 -- IAFF delegates meeting in San Diego unanimously passed an emergency resolution condemning Uniontown, Pennsylvania, Mayor Edward Fike for announcing his intent to eliminate the City’s entire career fire department. Fike no doubt picked the wrong time to mess with union fire fighters. As it happened, members of Uniontown Local 955 were convening in San Diego this week with about 3,500 of their IAFF brothers and sisters to vote on critical resolutions and forge stronger union bonds.
August 26, 2010– The 2010 Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon is scheduled for September 5-6, 2010, and will be broadcast live from the South Point Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Telethon will air on more than 170 television stations and on the MDA web site.
IAFF delegates from the United States and Canada gathered August 23 at the San Diego Convention Center for the IAFF 50th Convention, launching the week’s important business. The emotional ceremony reminded all in attendance of the accomplishments and sacrifices members have made and laid out plans to overcome the challenges ahead.
August 18, 2010 -- Two hundred and forty-five entries in the 2010 Media Awards Contest attest to the fact that for today’s fire fighter, truth is stranger than fiction. People and animals, buildings and systems fail and endanger others in unique and largely unpredictable ways. A seemingly infinite series of natural and manmade catastrophes cause fire fighters everywhere to give their all, all day and all night. The Media Awards Contest honors communications, reporting and photography that best portray the professional and dangerous work of fire fighters and emergency medical personnel in the United States and Canada.
August 16, 2010 -- The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will begin accepting applications for Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grants beginning August 16, 2010. The application period will close September 17, 2010, at 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time. Applications for $420 million in SAFER funding will be available through the Assistance to Firefighters (FIRE Act) web site, along with program guidance.
August 13, 2010 -- A study conducted by San Diego State University on wildfire fire fighting and staffing shows that lower levels of staffing result in higher physical stress and significantly lower efficiencies for initial attack effectiveness. The most dramatic gains in efficiency - by as much as 50 percent - occurred when the number of personnel on a hose lay was increased from two to three fire fighters. Additional increases were observed when comparing three- to four-person crews.
August 11, 2010 -- State legislators are beginning to challenge one of the ironclad tenets of public pension policy: that states cannot legally reduce pension benefits for current and future retirees. Lawmakers in Colorado, Minnesota and South Dakota voted earlier this year to limit cost-of-living increases they previously had promised to thousands of current and future retirees. Not surprisingly, retirees in each state have filed lawsuits asking judges to restore their annual benefit increases to what they were previously. Lawmakers, state retirement systems, public employee unions and others in the pension policy arena are closely watching the outcome of the legal challenges.
August 2, 2010 -- Angered by the way they're treated by the mayor and City Council, unions representing fire fighters and police officers put up an attack ad on a downtown billboard. The sign reads, "Welcome to Baltimore. Home to a Mayor & City Council who turned their backs on our Police & Firefighters."
August 2, 2010 – A sea of fire fighters, family and friends flowed into Bridgeport, Connecticut, to pay tribute to fallen Bridgeport Local 834 fire fighters Steven Velasquez, 40, and Michel Baik, 49. Services for Velasquez and Baik were held July 30.
July 30, 2010 -- Legislation to establish health treatment and monitoring programs for World Trade Center responders was narrowly defeated in the U.S. House of Representatives. The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act, H.R. 847, failed by a vote of 255-159 July 29.
July 28, 2010 – Members of Kern County, CA Local 1301, CDF Fire Fighters Local 2881 and strike teams from around the state of California are working in 12-hour shifts, 24 hours a day to contain two wildfires burning
July 28, 2010 – Thousands of fire fighters, family and friends are expected to travel to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to pay their respects to two fallen Bridgeport Local 834 fire fighters on Friday, July 30. Steven Velasquez, 40, and Michel Baik, 49, made the ultimate sacrifice Saturday, July 24, while fighting a house fire.
July 23, 2010 -- The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has awarded another round of Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grants, this time totaling $3,010,741. All six of the awards in this 13th round of SAFER grants will help bring IAFF members back to work.
July 25, 2010 -- The IAFF regrets to report the deaths of two Bridgeport, CT Local 834, fire fighters July 24. Lieutenant Steven Velazquez and Fire Fighter Michel Baik were killed while fighting a residential fire. General President Harold Schaitberger has been in contact with 3rd District Vice President Mike Mullane and Bridgeport Local 834 President Bob Whitbread. Further details will be provided as they become available.
July 19, 2010 -- For fire fighter Mark Kovach, the reality of municipal budget cuts hit home when he was tumbling down the staircase of a burning building in Flint, Michigan, after failing to rescue a man trapped on the second floor. After cutbacks last year, Kovach's crew had only a small vehicle with basic equipment to respond to fires, not the usual ladder and pumping trucks. Absent water to beat back the flames, the blaze at a single-family home in late April of last year turned into an inferno that left Kovach with severe burns. Events are not always so dramatic as that night in Flint, but the most searing economic downturn since the Great Depression is relentlessly transforming the type and quantity of municipal services that citizens can expect from their local governments.
July 19, 2010 -- The list of suspended locals published on page 5 of the May-June issue of the International Fire Fighter incorrectly identified the following locals by the names of the cities in their mailing addresses -- not by their official names. This was a publishing error, as our membership records accurately reflect the official names of each of these locals. We apologize for the error.
July 16, 2010 -- The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has awarded another round of Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grants, this time totaling $10,923,018 to help bring fire fighters back to work. These grants come at a critical time for IAFF affiliates as they struggle to prevent layoffs and maintain staffing levels in the face of tight budgets.
July 13, 2010 -- The IAFF has lost one of its most dedicated leaders, former Virginia Professional Fire Fighters (VPFF) Secretary-Treasurer and Roanoke Local 1132 President Emeritus D. Duane Dixon. Duane passed away July 10, 2010, after a courageous battle with cancer.
