EMS Union Upset About Proposed Changes

I'll point out that in exchange for that money - they had to all become certified firefighters, AND spend 2 1/2 weeks a year in training to boot (100 hours) - for something that LFR wouldn't even let them do, since LFR never considered them to be REAL firefighters. It was just a scam on the state to make it look like they got a raise. It would be more cost effective (less OT to cover the folks in training, etc.) to just raise their salaries. No, they should not have lost a dime by that process. (That's why it is a problem to segment out salaries by using longevity pay - it doesn't count in the base rate so when they start monkeying with hours, which they can do, you lose money - let's just add it together, divide it by 80 hours (for two weeks) and make THAT the hourly rate. And give people a raise every year they work. (Trust me, scity employee for years, non contract employees, that is, often got zero raise, no longevity, nothing.)

I don't particularly want the paramedic working on me to have been up for 24 hours - firefighters usually get a nights sleep - the EMS crews often did not. 12 hours is much more rational.

And "old EMS" was considered a national model - Jerry changed it for reasons that had nothing to do with the quality of the agency.