My best friend is in the HFD and is a paramedic. We’ve talked about this a ton recently, and while I obviously want what’s best for my buddy, I also want it to be handled responsibly by the city. I wish the proposition gave them x amount of years to enact it. They should give paramedics a bigger bump than they do from regular firefighters. On a normal day if he’s on the ambulance he will make 18 calls, while someone at his station on the ladder will make 1-2. People can say “well I’ve seen them grocery shopping while on the clock”... that’s true, but there’s also police officers in slow districts, and they were just given a monster raise. A FF in the academy makes around 20 (can’t remember if he said 18 or 28) grand while his police counterpart makes 40. Starting pay for HPD is 60, 40 for HFD.
I'd really like to hear the police's perspective on this prop. By being tied this way, they're bargaining power will be impacted. The city would likely be more resistant to future pay increases because it'd require them to bump firefighters also and have a bigger budget hit. Does the police union support or oppose?
Paramedics do get paid more. And the call volume is more based on area they are at. And at the academy is 28 thousand for around 9 months.
1.That’s why I stated a larger bump in pay than they do now which isn’t very much. 2. Same applies to police officers. 3. How long is the police academy?
Police did just get a 7 percent raise without the mayor professing that the city would go bankrupt. And PD academy is 6 months.
Maybe they should. Its mismanagement of finances is a pro privatization argument. It doesn't affect every day life like police department
Slam dunk. Firefighters should stand on their own just like the police do, instead of freeloading on the back of police. Should flight attendants get pay parity with pilots?
Again, I have no dog in this fight but I will add that a firefighter with nothing to do is a VERY GOOD thing. Point being I do not think pay should be based on the amount of calls they make because nobody wants a fireman to make any calls.
Exactly there are no fires. How much work do the non paramedics get. Its an issue, not on salaries but on the future of the Department This has been an issue with me since before the pension crisis
I tend to agree. I am a Mayor Turner fan so I was biased before viewing but after I am convinced the negotiations broke down and the FD union sent a tactical nuke. You have to remember the FD is negotiating against our funds for potholes, city services, schools etc. And Turner is dealing with a fiscal crisis he inherited from the worthless annise parker.
My bro in law is an HPD sergeant. He had explained to me how the HFD union went to the HPD union to get their support for a pay raise, and got it. THEN they dropped the pay parity bomb. Without going into detail, we both know firefighters and are aware of some of the things they get away with on the job. This afternoon at a restaurant, he lit into their union and told me (in effect) they have bargained in bad faith with the city for years. It's almost as if they wanted the "crisis" to get so bad that pay parity would seem to be the only remedy because the city refuses to treat them fairly (which is a false narrative). If Houston voters are ignorant enough to approve this, they deserve to consequences.
Fire trucks still go on all medical calls that paramedics go on. Along with false alarms, car accidents, busted pipes, carbon monoxide calls, elevator rescue, etc, etc. But paramedics are also firefighters that rotate on fire trucks. The EMS and Fire are one in the same. The way it works is say there is a CPR. They send the firetruck, a BLS, Supervisor and a ALS that is the closest available. The reason ALS are busier though is that there is less of them in the city so they could get called out to a area that is not their area due to lack of ALS they have in the city at the time of the call. The city knows this but won't add more paramedics because that means paying more. It makes sense for firefighters to use HPD for pay due to the other major cities like Chicago, New York City, LA, and Dallas all have parity. Turner had said they should align their pay to other fire departments but then stopped saying that due to pay of other departments just in Texas. <a href='' title=''><img src='http://i.imgur.com/1iGHrRE.jpg' alt='' title='Hosted by imgur.com' /></a>
A first year firefighter should not be earning close to what a first year engineering grad makes. That's an insane salary for a career track that doesn't require any college degree until lieutenant and then you need an associates degree that the city pays the tuition for.
That's why parity with PD makes more sense. And just a few years ago you needed 60 hours of college credit or 2 years of service to get in. They lowered that to 16 hours because they couldn't get enough people to sign up largely due to paid. I mean you could look at the Austin testing and you will see 5 times more people sign up due to pay and that they do not provide EMS to the city.
Pay parity makes no sense to me. Your arguments so far consist of other cities do it, and we need it so salaries don't get high. The second argument is undercut a bit by salaries are low in Houston without pay parity. I like firefighters a million times more than I like cops but the entire premise seems flawed and bogus.
I don't have a dog in this fight, but out of curiosity, on a daily basis how many calls are responded to by HFD and how many calls are responded to by HPD?
If that is your best argument (which it actually is), very weak. Just because those cities have it doesn't mean it's a good idea. Houston Firefighters should be paid more than they are, but this mandated "pay parity" notion is not the solution. Let's hope the general public is aware of the vast differences in daily activities between firefighters and policemen.
