“Over 200 Massachusetts EMTs Suspended in Certification Scheme” is a headline that will get your attention!

Many of you will recall that FirefighterNation posted a news story back on May 27, 2010 about this: http://firefighternation.com/forum/topics/boston-firefighters-among.

In a recent news article (http://firefighternation.com/forum/topics/over-200-massachusetts-emts) that was posted on June 18, 2010, you will find more current information, including punishments that have already been delivered.

It has also been handed over to the states’ attorney general for further action, if warranted.

What struck me was the very last comment in the http://firefighternation.com/forum/topics/over-200-massachusetts-emts article. It stated:

Auerbach said some of the EMTs caught up in the probe expressed remorse for their actions, but others ‘did not quite understand the severity of their actions!

That statement simply blows me away.

Is it stealing?

Is it cheating?

Is it fraud?

Is it a criminal act?

Now; I am not sitting on my pedestal, high atop of moral ground, but; when you commit a dishonest act, you can either continue down that path and end up in REAL trouble or you can see the errors of your ways and correct it.

We are not talking about sneaking a peek at someone’s poker hand when they leave the table to go to the restroom.

We are not talking about taking a couple of tomatoes from your neighbor’s garden.

We are not talking about a kid writing the answers on their arm to test questions on a high school exam.

We are not talking about someone who drives 5 mph over the posted speed limit.

We are not talking about someone’s indiscretion only hurting them.

No; we are talking about someone who took money to go to classes, did not attend those classes and received credit anyway and was re-certified as a giver of advanced medical care.

We are talking about actions taken that will hurt a fire department ambulance service and a community for months and even years to come.

Others on the fire department who did the required work to re-certify as an EMT will be resentful and distrustful of those who “bought” their re-certification.

The face of the fire department will no longer be the face of one of the most trusted occupations on Earth.

The public will feel that their trust has been violated. They won’t know who to trust. They won’t know which ones cheated and which ones didn’t, so they will distrust ALL of them! It doesn’t matter to the public if this is the first or the tenth time. The time is NOW.

So; though the public might not be interested in learning the pathology of this scandal, I have to wonder if this type of behavior has been reinforced by years of not getting caught for other dishonest acts.

I have to wonder if these thieves cheated on exams during their high school days, then college and then, they fabricated a job resume that got them hired to their jobs. I wonder if they are getting “free” cable TV from their neighbors.

In their world, dishonesty has become their reality, so they would not view their dishonest actions as wrong or at the very least “no big deal”.

They got caught this time, so they’ll just pay the money again and take the test. No problem, right?

Ask yourself if you would rather have someone who cheated at card games, but studied hard, did their practicals, kept up on their in-service training so that they could re-certify their EMT license OR someone who paid off an instructor to get a free pass on their re-certification. Hmmm…

Get out the deck of cards!

How screwed up does your moral compass have to be to NOT comprehend that lying, cheating and stealing to gain re-certification of life-saving skills is wrong?

Here’s a paradoxical question for you and you don’t have to raise your hand: how many of you would cheat if you KNEW that you could get away with it?

Some of you will answer “no” and will be completely honest.

Some of you will answer “no” and be lying about it.

Some of you will answer “yes” because, in your mind, the reward is worth the risk.

Some of you will answer “yes” but will try to rationalize it with the old “I didn’t have time to study” argument.

Still, some of you will answer “yes” because the few times that you got caught, you simply had to re-take the test, get lectured by your parents and promise never to do it again. Oh; the AGONY!

So; would an EMT who got their certification COD be qualified? Would YOU want to take that chance?

How would you feel if you found out that the guy who did your surgery was actually the night shift janitor at the hospital?

Or that the marriage counselor that you are seeing has been divorced FIVE times?

How about the drivers’ education teacher who has not had a valid drivers’ license for three years (DUI) and is teaching your sweet child?

I know how I would feel!

Why then, would instructors want to risk their teaching certificates and their students be willing to violate the public’s trust?

For the money?

Because they are lazy?

Because they didn’t think that they would get caught?

Because they thought that they knew everything anyway?

Because they thought that they were “different and special”?

Because they didn’t care?

Because they weren’t smart enough to pass it on their own?

No matter; rational people won’t be willing or able to justify it under any circumstances.

It may not feel good to be beaten by a team that cheats, but it would feel worse to “out-cheat” them in order to win. Remember: cheaters never win and winners never cheat!

We have to continue to believe that hard work has its rewards. Honesty, integrity, moral fiber and ethics have to drive those of us who are in public safety.

If we don’t conduct ourselves in that manner, then we will be facing moral dilemmas each and every day.

And little by little, our public’s trust will continue to erode.

TCSS.

The article is protected by federal copyright law under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella. It is written and submitted by Art Goodrich a.k.a. ChiefReason. This article or any other article submitted under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella cannot be reproduced in ANY form without the expressed, written permission of the author. Violations are punishable by applicable laws.

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When did we become a society where cheating has become so acceptable and almost fashionable?

Everywhere we turn; we are hearing or reading about another incident of cheating. Pages and pages of examples of yet someone caught or accused of cheating.

Another headline; another cheater exposed.

Students caught cheating on their SATs. (They are “pressured” by parents to get into the best colleges)

Teachers caught cheating on their standardized testing of students. (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/10/28/national/main580355.shtml The teachers “care too much, sometimes)

College professor caught cheating on their resume. (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/10/20/BA186979.DTL Professor provided “inaccurate information”)

Wife caught cheating on husband. Husband caught cheating on wife. Each blames the other.

Politicians accused of stealing elections. ACORN accused of faking voter registrations. Sports teams accused of stealing opponents’ playbook. Coach accused of allowing the use of steroids among players. Players accused of using corked bats. Pitchers accused of using Vaseline on baseballs. Another college coach accused of cheating with recruit program. Alumni accused of funneling money to college players. EMTs accused of getting copy of state test to “study”. Firefighters accused of defrauding disability benefits. Mayor accused diverting tax money to campaign fund. City treasurer accused of taking over $100,000 dollars in tax money.

And on and on. Examples of cheating with no end in sight. Call it what you want-fraud, misappropriations, caring too much, inaccurate information, juicing, doping, adultery, bad decision, embellishing, plagiarism,  winning at all costs, spying, bribery, intimidation, looking the other way-but, it’s still cheating and most of it goes on without an appropriate, severe response to it.

I can remember when being called a “cheater” was grounds for a fistfight. It was a term that was so reviled that you didn’t say it, unless you could back it up with fists. But anymore, it would seem that you aren’t a cheater, unless you are caught! Where our conscience used to be the driving force behind our moral decisions, in today’s world, it is evident that you aren’t gaining if you aren’t cheating somehow to secure the desired end result. And when other people can see the benefits, they will risk the downside against getting caught.

But, where did it all start? When did we see the “warning signs” that would get us to where we are today?

Could it be traced back to Biblical times? Perhaps, we can go back to David and Goliath. Goliath came to the fight, believing that his size was going to beat his opponent. David showed up with a sling and some rocks. You know the saying: never bring a sword to a rock fight! David slue Goliath that day because he cheated? Or did he “out-smart” his opponent? Well; the Philistines would say that David cheated, but the Israelites would disagree. That would lend itself to my previous assertion that we “package” the cheating with candy for the brain; that is, we use less offensive terms to rationalize the act.

Could it have come from the days of the Old West when a gunslinger would carry two guns instead of one? Let’s face it; the days of the honorable “duel” between two combatants had been gone for some time (see Burr vs. Hamilton). It seems silly to me that two guys would face each other with the end result of one fatally shooting the other without one of them serpentining or dropping to the ground to take his shot at the other, but I digress.

I realize that the last two examples may be stretching it, but, to be honest, I am at a loss for where our society took that moral turn towards such dishonesty. You could cite several political figures during the past century alone where corruption/dishonesty/cheating were discovered after the fact.

And in today’s world, you can see more current examples each and every time you pick up a newspaper or turn on the television news.

Obviously, I am interested in how we behave as a national fire service and it bothers me to see cheating among our minions. A few years ago, Illinois was without a state EMT test, because some firefighters were caught cheating. It took just over two years to restore the test and its integrity.

More recently, a firefighter was caught on video at a bodybuilding competition, even though he was on disability from his fire department. (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,386570,00.html) What does that say about him, his department and our national fire service if a swift response is not delivered? I understand that we live in a society where we are innocent until proven guilty, so an alleged case of fraud is pending. But, you have to admit (1) The firefighter was granted disability, (2) He was video-taped competing at a bodybuilding competition, (3) He didn’t get into that condition from being “disabled” and (4) You can’t blame his parents, fire department or doctor for such a brazen display of cheating.

We also have reports of cheating on firefighter exams. Although it is one of the keys to the door to the greatest job in the world, I don’t think that one should come by those “keys” by stacking the deck and slipping cards up their sleeves for the advantage. See related link: http://www.firefighternation.com/forum/topics/cheating-discovered-in

There is no gene that exists in us that causes us to cheat. Cheating has to be taught and it has to be learned and that is where the effort to stomp it out has to start. The response to it has to be so strong as to discourage it from happening again. It has to be so powerful of a message that it tells others that are tempted to do so not to even THINK about it.

As long as we are willing to put a cute little tag on it and make it more palatable to swallow, it will continue to grow into a much bigger monster than it is today.

As long as we accept cheating in the most innocuous forms such as cheating the speed limit, cheating the stoplight, cheating on our training, cheating our bodies of physical conditioning and good diet, cheating our SOGs and cheating our taxpayers, we will continue to see a rising problem with few remedies.

Winners never cheat and cheaters never win?

I’m not convinced at this point.

Are you?

TCSS.

Art

The article as submitted is published under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella and is the intellectual property of Art Goodrich a.k.a. ChiefReason. It is protected by federal copyright laws and cannot be re-printed in any form without expressed permission from the author. You may read other works by the author at www.chiefreasonart.com.

…does not have a professional fleet manager or professional maintenance technicians, which is surprising given the size and costs of the fleet, the complexity of the vehicle3s and equipment comprising it and the criticality of these assets to the Department’s ability to fulfill its mission…

…these positions were eliminated for budgetary reasons in the early 1980s.

…fleet is overseen by a combination of career firefighters and civilians…

…Maintenance Department includes firefighter superintendent and assistant superintendent positions, both of which are currently unfilled…

…positions are not clearly defined…

…no formal position descriptions…

…some titles used…are clearly archaic…

…chiefs who oversee the Division generally are close to retirement…have no particular background in facility or fleet management and maintenance…

…firefighters assigned to the Division can leave and rejoin a field company, so there is no incentive to spend much effort or money to ensure that these technicians are properly trained…

…Has been reluctant to invest in the development of in-house fleet management expertise…

…this is the primary reason that the Department’s fleet management practices are deficient in many areas…

…staffing level is difficult to gauge. Normally, a fleet maintenance organization requires …detailed records on how they spend their time…to measure, among other things, technician productivity and efficiency…however, BFD does not maintain such records…

…day-to-day inspection of apparatus is inconsistent at best…the failure to perform such inspections is emblematic of a larger problem…has tended to react to problems…rather than trying to prevent them…

…lack of a sense of ownership of and responsibility for apparatus…the uneven and unpredictable utilization of apparatus…lack of appreciation for the costs of repairing vs. preventive maintenance…

On March 6, 2009, Report on Maintenance Practices Assessment for the Boston FD was released by Mercury Associates, Inc. to Commissioner Roderick J. Fraser, Jr. of the Boston FD.

If there has been a discussion on the report’s findings, then I must have been asleep at the wheel, because this report was commissioned AFTER Lt. Kevin Kelley died in an apparatus accident, where the mechanical condition of the apparatus was suspect.

I can sum up the report in one word: STARTLING!

Mercury Associates, Inc. is a company that provides fleet management consulting services. According to the report, in the last three years alone, they have provided their services to Boston Police Department (don’t they talk to the fire department?), Charlotte, Houston, Las Vegas, Louisville, Oakland (CA), Orlando, Philadelphia, Salt Lake, San Antonio, San Francisco, Seattle, Tampa, Washington, DC and Vancouver, British Columbia.

The last paragraph in the introduction opens a door to a culture that has existed at Boston FD for at least since the 1980s (see report). It states: Ideally, an assessment of this type would have included the review of policy and procedure statements and other documentation that specifies ‘how’ all maintenance and repair activities are to be performed and the calculation of a variety of key performance indicator statistics and their interpretation using suitable industry benchmarks so as to gauge ‘how well’ they are being performed. However, as will become clear in this report, neither of these types of information are readily available in BFD because they are not used to any significant degree to manage the maintenance and repair of the fleet.

I interpret this to mean that no one person was tasked with insuring the safety of Boston’s fleet of fire apparatus. An “informal” system to prevent problems, identify problems and correct problems with apparatus was in place, but was an orphan in its treatment by the city and FD leaders.

Again; remember the outcry after Lt. Kevin Kelley was killed. Remember that it was quickly noted in articles after the tragedy that this was not an isolated incident where the safety of the vehicle was identified as a potential problem.

It becomes very clear upon reading the report how apparatus with problems remained in service.

It leaves me wondering AGAIN why someone has to die in order for Change to occur.

How can a department as storied as Boston’s have a fleet maintenance department that is described in the report as ‘archaic’? How can ANY department treat maintenance of their equipment with such indifference?

Small departments, such as mine, understand the importance of keeping equipment properly maintained to avoid costly repairs because in many cases, they do not have a budget that could support them. Most likely, the money would have to be borrowed if not covered by warranty.

In larger departments, where apparatus sees multiple calls in a day, there has to be a clearly defined system for recognizing mechanical problems, taking the unit out of service for repair and a “loaner” to take its place until that unit is repaired and placed back into service. It cannot be left to chance.

At a time when the focus in on personal safety, what could possibly be more important than equipment that gets us to and from the scene?

What good does it do to hammer home the idea that we should only use professionally designed, professionally built apparatus if we’re not going to keep it in safe, operating condition?

Where I came from, it wasn’t unusual for a department to refurbish or rebuild their own trucks to save money. Water tanks could be increased in size without any regard for gross vehicle weight. No tank baffles and a higher center of gravity was a rollover waiting to happen. Forget about stopping quickly; the extra weight made sure that wasn’t going to happen, but again, it was about saving money and not about safety. The truck that AnnDee Huber died in was home-made, driven by a drunk that was home-grown!

Read the Report. Carefully review the twelve (12) recommendations that were made.

After you read the report, ask yourselves if any of it resembles how you regard vehicle maintenance and if it does, then it’s time to get something done about it!

Ignoring problems won’t make them go away.

It only makes for bigger problems and if you’re like my department, you won’t have enough money in the bank to cover it.

And most importantly, you won’t have enough heartache, sorrow or tears should it lead to a fatality.

TCSS.

Art

The article as submitted is published under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella and is the intellectual property of Art Goodrich a.k.a. xchief22 and ChiefReason. It is protected by federal copyright laws and cannot be re-printed in any form without expressed permission from the author. You may read other works by the author at www.chiefreasonart.com.

On January 9, 2009, Lt. Kevin Kelley of the Boston Fire Department was killed when the rig he was riding crashed, while returning to quarters.

Photos posted at the many firefighter websites show Boston FD Ladder 26 penetrating a brick building.

Lt. Kevin Kelley was a 30-year veteran of the department. Video footage of his funeral showed a procession befitting of a fallen hero and one described as the “bravest of the brave”.

At 30 years in the service of his beloved Boston FD, Lt. Kelley was adding the final chapters to his colorful career with appearances on Firehouse USA: Boston.

His blue collar/no bullshit approach to his craft endeared him to his men, his fire department, community and a nation of brothers and sisters. His attitude and his love for the job were crystal clear during his camera time on Firehouse USA.

Tribute upon tribute confirms that Lt. Kelley still had a boyish excitement about going to work every shift and that is extraordinary, because with 30 years in, you have had plenty of time to be hurt, to be discouraged, disheartened, frustrated; to become bitter, disillusioned, confused, angry and contemplative of tossing it all.

Lt. Kelley didn’t do that. He drew his strength from brotherhood and I believe that he wouldn’t allow anything-emotion or politics-to drive a wedge into it. And that’s why I think that Lt. Kevin Kelley would be disappointed to read and to see some of the reactions to his tragic death.

I never knew him and I never met him. I cannot tell you any “Two-Times” stories. I only know of him through the power of multi-media.

But, I am also NOT going to say that all I need to know is that he was a firefighter, because from what I have seen in video and read about him, I want to know more about Lt. Kevin Kelley.

I want to read those stories about a 30-year guy who loved every minute of his time on this Earth, taking care of business and not allowing anything else to complicate it.

We didn’t lose another firefighter. We lost a national treasure. This was a guy who had something worth hearing, because you knew it was coming from the heart.

I would have loved to have gone and listened to him talk about his craft, but I don’t think we would have seen him on the lecture circuit, because it was never about HIM. He was just happy to go to work.

So, I’m going to let the city hall jag-offs spin damage control.

I’m going to let the other fire service pundits speculate on a myriad of possible causes.

But I will NOT allow mutts to use Lt. Kevin Kelley’s tragic death to promote their self-serving and insidious agendas, because he deserves WAY better than that.

Normally, I would be screaming for accountability, but I can’t this time; not yet anyway. I am still shaken by the fact that Lt. Kevin Kelley will NEVER get to look back on his glorious career as a jake and to know that he made a difference and touched so many lives.

I intend to honor him because he touched my life and reminded me that pride and integrity still counts for something and to never, ever take for granted what we do and to remember that it is of the highest privilege that we are allowed to be a part of this great nation’s fire service.

God bless you, Lt. Kevin Kelley.

Published 1/15/09

The article as submitted is published under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella and is the intellectual property of Art Goodrich a.k.a. xchief22 and ChiefReason. It is protected by federal copyright laws and cannot be re-printed in any form without expressed permission from the author.