At the risk of repeating myself, but doing so anyway, I've noted before that people prefer problems that are familiar to solutions that are not. I consider myself fortunate to live in a city that has one paid fire department and five volunteer fire departments with skilled and talented firefighters, but what I perceive as good fortune is not necessarily true for all. I live in the Consolidated City District, CCD, and pay additional property taxes for the fire department that protects me and my neighbors.
I don't think many, if any, of us are happy about the surcharge on our tax bills but as the current buzz phrase would have it, 'it is what it is.' Having been on a Charter Revision Committee in 1999 that was charged by the then-City Council to amend the charter to address and resolve the disparities between the City and Town property tax rates caused by the differences in fire services I learned it wasn't because of the charter but of the political will, and lack of, by the City Council.
That was two decades ago so my memory might be a little fuzzy, but I think at that time we on the committee were told more than one once by residents that in their memories of living in Norwich there had been numerous previous studies intended either to spread the tax burden across the entire city or better share fire fighting responses and responsibilities.
You're welcome to feel I've over-simplified those two positions but I think not; a joke I remember at the time was if all the previous studies were laid end to end they wouldn't reach a conclusion. I don't recall anyone laughing.
Meanwhile, proving those who cannot learn from history are fated to repeat it, last Monday, as The Bulletin reported a divided-along-party-lines City Council voted 4-3 in favor of expending a little more than $80,000 for an(other) "independent fire services study' by the McGrath Consulting Group, of Wonder Lake, Illinois.
The article notes all three Republicans voted against the study because "there are more pressing concerns amid the coronavirus pandemic than a study that could be performed in-house by the department chiefs and city staff."
I don't think any of us had Coronavirus Pandemic on our 2020 Bingo Card, so in terms of other and competing concerns for funding, that point is well taken at least to a degree. But as for the 'performed in-house by the department chiefs and city staff ' part of their objection, and I'm basing this on my almost twenty-nine years of living here, that's disingenuous.
It's been close to impossible to get everyone who fights fires in Norwich to sit at one table with the City Manager, ever, and work to eliminate what Alderman Joseph DeLucia called, "pervasive issues surrounding the fire service in Norwich (that) have existed for decades.”
We are not the only municipality in Connecticut blessed with both paid and volunteer firefighters; other cities have succeeded in creating hybrid or mixed departments combining both so it’s not like we’re sailing forth into uncharted waters.
At the risk of you thinking me a cynic, I say we enjoy wringing our hands about our pervasive issues because we don't have the political will to take the actions that previous studies, like the one just commissioned, have outlined.
We are again confusing talking about solving a problem without actually solving the problem, which is unfair to not only both the volunteer and professional firefighters who protect us but also to one another.
-bill kenny
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