Firefighters Watch As House Burns Down

[Ravi]

No...according to the article I posted, the county saved the city $280,000. And yet the city will not get off its ass and put out a fire that belongs to one of the people in the county that pays taxes that enabled the city to save $280,000.

No according to the articles you posted, $70,000 dollars was granted from the state to the county for an elementary school. The amount from the county is minimal and benefited the county as well. Truly misleading and unfounded point.

I guess you have a reading comprehension problem.

Quote:
Crocker said a major
accomplishment for city officials and the entire community in 2008 was
the reopening of the bridge on Forrestdale Avenue in South Fulton. He
said initial estimates were close to $300,000 for redoing the bridge,
but Vowell worked with Obion County Mayor Benny McGuire and the Obion
County Highway Department for the labor and the repairs were completed
for less than $20,000. “It’s already been inspected and passed and
reopened. That’d be the highlight of last year,” Crocker said. Vowell
also recalled several highlights from the past year, including the
city’s police and fire departments receiving some grant funding to help with operations


http://www.nwtntoday.com/news.php?viewStory=21174

 

[saveliberty]

We have to be getting to the part where you start returning to past points as if they were new. Yawn.

 

[Ravi]

You never addressed that point, or the point that the mayor claimed the fire and police departments got grants to help with their operations.

 

[saveliberty]

No...according to the article I posted, the county saved the city $280,000. And yet the city will not get off its ass and put out a fire that belongs to one of the people in the county that pays taxes that enabled the city to save $280,000.

No according to the articles you posted, $70,000 dollars was granted from the state to the county for an elementary school. The amount from the county is minimal and benefited the county as well. Truly misleading and unfounded point.

I guess you have a reading comprehension problem.

Quote:
Crocker said a major
accomplishment for city officials and the entire community in 2008 was
the reopening of the bridge on Forrestdale Avenue in South Fulton. He
said initial estimates were close to $300,000 for redoing the bridge,
but Vowell worked with Obion County Mayor Benny McGuire and the Obion
County Highway Department for the labor and the repairs were completed
for less than $20,000. “It’s already been inspected and passed and
reopened. That’d be the highlight of last year,” Crocker said. Vowell
also recalled several highlights from the past year, including the
city’s police and fire departments receiving some grant funding to help with operations


http://www.nwtntoday.com/news.php?viewStory=21174

...and the part where the county paid $280,000? Estimates are not dollars spent or saved. Seriously, get a clue.

 

[Ravi]

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

I think it is a riot that the firefighters called the cops on the reporters and the cops never showed up. I guess the firefighters never paid their "fee" to the cops.

 

[saveliberty]

Totally unrelated topic. I take it you concede the county pays point. Looks like about a $20,000 transfer to the COUNTY to me.

 

[Annie]

Seventy-five lousy dollars is cheap insurance and the homeowner was an asshole for not paying.

Nevertheless, the fire department should have put the fire out and then billed the homeowner for costs incurred.

I can't see how you could have a mortgage without paying for fire protection and fire insurance.

But I can't imagine any community that offers it as an option. Libertarianism gone wild

I said earlier that he most likely doesn't have a mortgage. Mortgage companies require homeowner's insurance. Insurance companies know the fire protection ratings of every town in US. It would have been required that he paid the $75 bucks to keep HO insurance. Thus my guess is that he's got a total loss there.

 

[Ravi]

Totally unrelated topic. I take it you concede the county pays point. Looks like about a $20,000 transfer to the COUNTY to me.

No...I see you are willfully ignoring the fact that the city benefits from the county and the city feels no reason to reciprocate.

 

[Mr Natural]

Seventy-five lousy dollars is cheap insurance and the homeowner was an asshole for not paying.

Nevertheless, the fire department should have put the fire out and then billed the homeowner for costs incurred.

I can't see how you could have a mortgage without paying for fire protection and fire insurance.

But I can't imagine any community that offers it as an option. Libertarianism gone wild

I said earlier that he most likely doesn't have a mortgage. Mortgage companies require homeowner's insurance. Insurance companies know the fire protection ratings of every town in US. It would have been required that he paid the $75 bucks to keep HO insurance. Thus my guess is that he's got a total loss there.

If that's the case, not only does he have a total loss, but his neighbors get to share in his loss through lowered property values due to a burned out hulk on their street.

 

[NYcarbineer]

This is a perfect example of why fire departments, police, and similar services should be taxpayer funded, period, and not under some wacky fee for service scheme.

If this town, or county, or township whatever it is funded a fire department out of local property taxes, like NORMAL people do,

then,

if this guy didn't pay his taxes he could be dealt with by the tax enforcement mechanism. He might face losing his house to back taxes, but he wouldn't face losing it to some insane scenario of the firefighters watching it burn down. That's medieval.

 

[JBeukema]

I think it is a bad policy to charge $75 to answer the phone

You're getting charged anyway. That what taxes are. The only difference here is that they were given the option to opt out if they're stupid enough.

when they plan on charging you $500 to put out the fire anyway.

They charge nothing. They ask for a $500 donation, much like many programmers of freeware programs ask for a donation. They have no legal way of making you pay if you don't want to.

I wonder if they then negotiate on the spot for each rescued person in the building...after all, it is not the fire departments fault some idiot is trapped in a burning house.

 

[uscitizen]

Wanna know what a conservative only world looks like? Look no further than Obion County, Tennessee:

Imagine your home catches fire but the local fire department won’t respond, then watches it burn. That’s exactly what happened to a local family tonight. A local neighborhood is furious after firefighters watched as an Obion County, Tennessee, home burned to the ground.

The homeowner, Gene Cranick, said he offered to pay whatever it would take for firefighters to put out the flames, but was told it was too late. They wouldn’t do anything to stop his house from burning. Each year, Obion County residents must pay $75 if they want fire protection from the city of South Fulton. But the Cranicks did not pay. The mayor said if homeowners don’t pay, they’re out of luck. [...]

We asked the mayor of South Fulton if the chief could have made an exception. “Anybody that’s not in the city of South Fulton, it’s a service we offer, either they accept it or they don’t,” Mayor David Crocker said.

Firefighters watch as home burns to the ground | WPSD Local 6 - News, Sports, Weather - Paducah KY | Local

As ThinkProgress points out:

A local newspaper further pressed Mayor Crocker about the city’s policy, which has been in place since 1990. Crocker, a Republican who was elected in 2008 and serves with a county commission where every seat is also filled by a Republican, likened the policy to buying auto insurance

Just one prime example of the difference between the way conservatives govern and the way progressives govern.

As TP put it:

One, the conservative vision, believes in the on-your-own society, and informs a policy agenda that primarily serves the well off and privileged sectors of the country. The other vision, the progressive one, believes in an American Dream that works for all people, regardless of their racial, religious, or economic background.

Think Progress Tennessee County’s Subscription-Based Firefighters Watch As Family Home Burns Down

That's the choice we have this november- The conservative fend-for-yourself (besides the companies that ship jobs overseas) choice, or the liberal I-am-my-brothers-keeper choice.

Libertarian government at work.

 

[JBeukema]

The problem is the one that happened here. Let's say you choose not to have fire protection and your home burns. That's fine. But then your neighbor, who did pay for fire protection, has to wait and watch his own house catch fire before the flames are put out. That second house never had to be damaged.

Take it a step further. Let's say the first neighbor's home is also not covered. So the fire department sits and waits for another home to catch. And then maybe another. At some point fires become too large to contain without extreme measures. Then what?

It's a big issue in towns like mine, full of 100-year old frame buildings built either as rowhomes or with very little space in between structures. Last year around this time we lost most of a block of the business district to a fire and had several small fires kindle downwind from smoldering debris carried on the breeze. And that was with firefighters able to respond and act immediately.

Which is why it's a public safety issue, not a personal property issue. You can lose a hell of a big chunk of a town to a single fire if it spreads too far before firefighters can get to work.

Perhaps that's why the city makes in mandatory whilst the country can leave it to your own discretion?

Even in the country it's a bad idea. JB. This sounded like a fairly rural area, and the neighbor's house still caught fire. You also have other issues in the country. Farms with their stocks of chemicals, things like fertilizers and pesticides, some depending on the area will have explosives on hand. Fuel tanks. Depending on the location and time of year there can be grass, brush or even forest fires. And of course in any township no matter how rural you have developers buying up farmland to put in denser housing areas on their little quarter or half acre lots. I just don't like the idea that the official stance of the municipality is to allow folks to put their neighbors in jeopardy, shrug and say "Oh well". When it's a public threat rather than a private one, protection should be mandatory.

Remember what happened in the days when all fire protection was private? There's a reason public fire departments were put into place.

I get it. 'The Greater Good' of 'The people', right?

You, ma'am are a communist.

'Tell them tax cuts for the fire companies would increase revenues, enabling them to write off, at their discretion, non-subscribers they're currently unable to help due to the Democrats stealing all their profits'

 

[JBeukema]

Actually they won't be paid at all if enough peole like the jerk in this story don't pay their fee

Yes, they will. They just won't leave the city.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Wanna know what a conservative only world looks like? Look no further than Obion County, Tennessee:

Imagine your home catches fire but the local fire department won’t respond, then watches it burn. That’s exactly what happened to a local family tonight. A local neighborhood is furious after firefighters watched as an Obion County, Tennessee, home burned to the ground.

The homeowner, Gene Cranick, said he offered to pay whatever it would take for firefighters to put out the flames, but was told it was too late. They wouldn’t do anything to stop his house from burning. Each year, Obion County residents must pay $75 if they want fire protection from the city of South Fulton. But the Cranicks did not pay. The mayor said if homeowners don’t pay, they’re out of luck. [...]

We asked the mayor of South Fulton if the chief could have made an exception. “Anybody that’s not in the city of South Fulton, it’s a service we offer, either they accept it or they don’t,” Mayor David Crocker said.

Firefighters watch as home burns to the ground | WPSD Local 6 - News, Sports, Weather - Paducah KY | Local

As ThinkProgress points out:


Just one prime example of the difference between the way conservatives govern and the way progressives govern.

As TP put it:

One, the conservative vision, believes in the on-your-own society, and informs a policy agenda that primarily serves the well off and privileged sectors of the country. The other vision, the progressive one, believes in an American Dream that works for all people, regardless of their racial, religious, or economic background.

Think Progress Tennessee County’s Subscription-Based Firefighters Watch As Family Home Burns Down

That's the choice we have this november- The conservative fend-for-yourself (besides the companies that ship jobs overseas) choice, or the liberal I-am-my-brothers-keeper choice.

Libertarian government at work.

A contradiction of terms.

Libertarianism works great on paper...

...unless of course the paper is flammable.

 

[NYcarbineer]

I thought it was just the federal government the rightwing nuts hated?

 

[JBeukema]

Are you aware of why the amount is $500 for a fire run? It is pretty standard across the entire US..

Source?

 

[uscitizen]

Wanna know what a conservative only world looks like? Look no further than Obion County, Tennessee:

Firefighters watch as home burns to the ground | WPSD Local 6 - News, Sports, Weather - Paducah KY | Local

As ThinkProgress points out:


Just one prime example of the difference between the way conservatives govern and the way progressives govern.

As TP put it:


Think Progress Tennessee County’s Subscription-Based Firefighters Watch As Family Home Burns Down

That's the choice we have this november- The conservative fend-for-yourself (besides the companies that ship jobs overseas) choice, or the liberal I-am-my-brothers-keeper choice.

Libertarian government at work.

A contradiction of terms.

Libertarianism works great on paper...

...unless of course the paper is flammable.

Libertarianism is just a pipe dream it will not work with humans until we progress to a much higher level of maturity. Maybe it will work in a thousand years or so.

 

[JBeukema]

Step back and look at this concept for a minute.

If ALL government services were like this, you could eliminate much of a politican's power. You simply set up the cost of each service and an appropriate penalty for not purchasing the service. I want to sink my own water well instead of city water, ok. I have a 4x4 so I don't want the roads plowed. I don't support war, so I don't pay that tax. It would quickly prioritize what the public wants and their level of financial participation.

I see serious feasibility issues with that.

 

[JBeukema]

Step back and look at this concept for a minute.

If ALL government services were like this, you could eliminate much of a politican's power. You simply set up the cost of each service and an appropriate penalty for not purchasing the service. I want to sink my own water well instead of city water, ok. I have a 4x4 so I don't want the roads plowed. I don't support war, so I don't pay that tax. It would quickly prioritize what the public wants and their level of financial participation.

Works well in Somalia.

Fail. There are no government services in Somalia. There is no functioning government in Somalia.

A more accurate analogy would be everyone being their own fire company. Anarcho-capitalism, perhaps.