Kapler gave me some stats, comparing response time in 2008 to response time in 2009 since brown outs began. (His stats are from before last week when the department changed the vehicle slated to be closed when staffing levels drop below 27 because of illness or vacation from a Bay Farm ambulance to the engine at station five, the western-most Island station.)

In 2008, the average time in took both vehicles (staffed by five firefighters/paramedics) to be at the scene of an emergency was four minutes and 19 seconds. Any time you call for help in Alameda two vehicles will come. The first will be a fire engine with a paramedic and two firefighters and the second will be an ambulance with another paramedic and another firefighter. By way of benchmark, the county standard for average response time is eight minutes.

During the ‘brown out’ period—from January 26 to March 17—average response time (that means, again, the time it took both vehicles to arrive) was 4 minutes and 48 seconds. That’s a 30-second increase. Again, that’s not the time it took the first vehicle to arrive (which was, I saw, glancing over Kapler’s chart, still almost always under four minutes) but the time it took both vehicles to arrive. Kapler had this to say about the impact:

Budgetarily it is necessary for the fire department to reduce spending. And we believe that the plans that we have in place with provide the best possible service and have the least impact on the community and we monitor this day to day and we review our plans monthly and if we see adjustments are necessary and a better way to do it we implement changes. But the service level with 24 is not as good as the service level with 27, but we’re attempting to make it as seemless as possible.

For another way to look at the statistics, the firefighters are tracking ‘effected’ incidents. By which it is my understanding they mean any call that is made to a station that has a ‘browned out’ ambulance or fire engine. You can see their info here.

Alameda firefighters are working out of contract and are in ongoing negotiations with the city. They are also collecting signatures for an amendment to the city charter that would set minimum staffing levels at 27, three up from the current (since January of this year) levels. And the city is suing to block the placement of the charter amendment.

I can’t help but think of the line from Obama’s speech Tuesday, in which he honored the hard work and sacrifices Americans are making to make things better for all of us. He referenced employees who allow their own hours to be cut so others may keep their jobs. That is bravery, no? To say, I will make do with a little less so others don’t lose everything entirely.

In a time when so many are losing jobs, losing retirement security, having their pay cut and otherwise struggling economically, I can not find legitimacy in the stance being taken by Alameda firefighters. There is not an infinite pot of money. Times are bad. Everyone should be impacted as budgets shrink…not everyone with the exception of some. Of course I wish it weren’t so…of course everyone wishes it weren’t so. But it is. So, it’s time to move away from the adversarial stance, an I-me-my orientation, and it’s time for the firefighters to work with the city to maintain emergency services as well as all the other services that make for a vital community.

As I have mentioned previously, Alameda firefighters make over $100,000 a year, with many earning 10 and 20 and 40 thousand additional dollars a year in over time. Alameda firefighters receive full, life-time medical benefits for themselves and a spouse after just five years of service. They are eligible to retire at 50, with 3 percent of their highest salary in pension for each year of service. Meanwhile, Alameda’s non-public safety employees receive only a tiny stipend (something around $100 a month) toward health care in retirement, and they are eligible to retire at 55, with 2 percent of their highest salary per year of service in pension. I am not, of course, saying that I don’t think firefighters should be well-compensated and have security in retirement…I just think that taking a hard bargain stance when the current system is so out of balance (so many employees now have no pensions, no health care on retirement…heck, no health care even while they are working) and when the economy is such a disaster is really perplexing.

While the story mentions the economic downturn as an underlying cause of the cuts, it fails to mention a second important key to the issue, that the cost of providing services in Alameda is incredibly high because of salaries and benefits negotiated by the International Association of Firefighters, Local 689, which represents Alameda’s firefighters. I find it hypocritical that while blaming the city for cut backs, the firefighters refuse to look at their own compensation packages. If each firefighter were paid less, the city could afford more. To pretend that can’t be an option, that the only option is to take an even higher portion of the city’s general fund or to cut service is disingenuous. I know you’re not supposed to talk this way about the men and women who protect us, and I know that I for one would rather not, but I think it is a fundamental part of this discussion and must be raised and raised again.

Also: the numbers put out by the union as reported in this piece, saying two pieces of equipment (an engine and an ambulance) being taken out of service every day, are entirely different from the estimates of service cut backs made by Fire Chief David Kapler at last Tuesday’s council meeting. In fact, the characterizations of the impact are so far apart it’s mind-numbing. The union is saying (as reported by KTVU) that it would be a fire engine and an ambulance that would be taken out of service almost every day. The Fire Chief told council last week that it would an ambulance (which, in Alameda, is generally the second vehicle to respond to a call…the first is a fire engine staffed with a paramedic) that would be taken out of service, and then only about 50 days a year, or 15 percent of the time.

More to come on this, I am sure.

But here is the question of the day: Average response time for the vast majority of calls in Alameda is four minutes…that means paramedics (and most calls for help are for medical emergencies, not fire) are usually are at your door in four minutes. Not bad. Pretty amazing, actually. And I understand the county sets eight minutes as a maximum average response time. But here is my question: How does the response time in Alameda compare to other East Bay cities and towns?