Recruits trained for fires, not EMT
Official says overworked paramedics needed help
By Bill Dries
March 14, 2005

The Memphis Fire Department has put 23 fire recruits in the city's firehouses before they've had emergency medical technician training.

The recruits, who account for half of the current class of 46, were put to work several weeks ago to reduce costs and cut overtime, said deputy fire director Alvin Benson.

"Those persons we put out early had 100 percent of their firefighter training. They just won't serve as EMTs," Benson said. "But they can go in and grab a hose line and do things that firefighters do."

Benson said the lack of medical training hasn't put citizens at risk but has helped to free overworked paramedics.

The 23 recruits will get their EMT training when they can be spared from the firehouses.

Like other city departments, the fire department is trying to find ways to reduce costs in the last four months of this fiscal year.

The department was criticized in a study last month for a deterioration of its Emergency Medical Service system.

Nearly 80 percent of calls to the Memphis Fire Department are for emergency medical services.

Fire Director Richard Arwood acknowledged the problems cited in the report by The Ludwig Group, a Missouri-based consulting firm.

The department also expects to fill the vacant position of EMS deputy chief in the next two months, Arwood told the City Council last month.

The department abandoned another cost-cutting measure in which some battalion chief positions were left unstaffed on certain shifts.

Battalion chiefs coordinate and supervise firefighting.

"We did that for three days. Certainly you had some questions raised by some of our folk. So just to ease concerns we just put it back like it was," Benson said.

"The same number of people got on the scene at the same time to your house. It's just the ranking chief who would have been dispatched -- there could have been some delay because he would have had to cover a little more territory. Citizens certainly wouldn't realize any difference at all."

-- Bill Dries: 529-264