City police and fire should stay in the City
Tags: City of Pensacola / Pensacola City Council / Pensacola Fire Department / Pensacola Police Department / Taxation
Currently, the City of Pensacola and Escambia County have a mutual agreement to provide police and fire services to each other when requested. For example, if there was a fire in the County, but there was a Pensacola Fire Department station closer to the fire, Escambia County could request that PFD respond, and we typically would. And vice-versa.
Tomorrow evening the Pensacola City Council will vote on an “Automatic Aid Response Agreement”, which would automate that process in certain areas, meaning basically that the closest units, whether City or County, would respond.
That all sounds great, in theory. In practice, City police and fire responds into the County much more often than the County responds into the City. My problem with that is that City residents pay a premium in taxes for the better services of City police and fire.
An example of this is the fire last year at Jerry’s Cajun Café. Jerry’s is located in unincorporated Escambia County, in one of a bunch of stupid enclaves created by our haphazard City limits. Even though PFD Station 6 is located about a half-mile from Jerry’s (you can see one from the other), it was a County fire and the City was not requested to respond for some time, and by then, the place was mostly gone.
Some folks say that’s a shame.
I say you get what you pay for.
Now, if Jerry Mistretta voluntarily annexed into the City, and paid City taxes, PFD trucks would have been there before it got out of the kitchen, and maybe he’d only have been closed for a few weeks instead of seven months.
Why would we as City taxpayers want to give County residents access to our better services for free?
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A very few months ago this same council claimed the city desperately needed a special fire assessment .
Now as gas goes up and the economy goes down, they think the city can afford to service county residents?
Get off the medication
Well, the thing is, we already are servicing them! At City taxpayer expense! When we’re making budget cuts to important services!
That should have been the first thing to go.
If Escambia County wants PPD/PFD to respond to issues in their jurisdiction, they should reimburse the City.
Was there a staff recommendation ?
If so, expect it to pass, even though council calls themselves the policymakers.
Oh yeah. Staff is behind it. I don’t expect them to care, most of them don’t live in the City.
And it shows—- No vested interest . But the bigger question is why so many staff choose the County or Santa Rosa County instead of the city they have helped create?
Don’t like the results?
Mr Cossun, Thank you for voicing what all of us at the PFD have been saying about this issue. We have been cut back to barely safe staffing levels and now they want us to leave the citizens that pay our salaries unprotected and respond to the county. This is irresponsible if not criminal. Again, a big thanks from the men and women of the PFD
And thank you Chuck, and your fellow PFD family, for being an absolutely top-notch, professional fire department. You guys are one of the reasons I live in the City. Don’t want that volunteer fire service. I love you all even if I am jealous of your pensions!
Point taken. Come by sta. 3 on summit one day for lunch ( my treat) and we can discuss that ugly P word. LOL