Looking at your department and community – is there a vision for the future? Is this vision consistent with the community’s vision for itself? Is the public aware of the vision? Do you agree with that vision?

#1

This is a good conversation to have with your fire department. When I get to work with my local fire department I always talk to them about their goal for the community. The fire departments goal every year is to have more community outreach. This is done by sending out notices with flyers about upcoming fire training. The training is free of course and everyone is welcome to attend no matter what age. The fire department goal is to teach about fire safety to everyone. The fire engines are on display and there are stationed set  up to act out real fire seniors. The fires are controlled and the fire fighters use small fires and have CO2 bottles on stations. They show how to properly use the bottles and also how to call for help. This is good training the fire department does on my fuel terminal with the locals. The kids and parents love it and they can even see the fire engines shoot out water. The event is for the community and the fire department also has other fire fighters from different parts of the city come and talk to the locals. We as the military work with them and we provide food for the community to eat and we mingle to together to build that trust and comradery The locals know that we will be there for them and we also teach them how to exit their homes and what to have with them to protect them in the event of a fire or emergency. We also talk about the dangers of smoke and not being careful when cooking or using fire. This is good for everyone’s safety and we try to have more people come out every year, so far the two years that I have been here have been very successful. 

#2

When it comes to looking at the vision of the future for the community, it may differ slightly from what they want comparatively. Since I live in a small town instead of  a newer or bigger city, They want to keep things to a more older style. They still want to live in the past and not advance anything and try to keep the old town feel and live even with the world constantly evolving.

Having a meeting that will change anything that could take away from the feel of being a old quite town can be painful. We want to make advancements that help the community in being safer when it comes to fires and all but most do not wish to listen because they want to think that it may pull away from the old southern town feel. We want to advance our coverage in the area by putting in another sub station from our main one that would help us with the distant area out of the actual town that is still in our district. The problem they are having with it is that the station would be in a part of the horse country as we call it and they think it would just be in the way and that the money for it would be wasted with it being out there.
 
We are trying to align their thoughts with ours. It does make it a bit of a pain but a lot of the community is behind us and our vision versus some of the ones on the board for the town. This helping push it but it is still a struggle to try and push it even when it is to help the community and make a reach to the furthest parts of our district.