The Turf Battle That Isn't

The Salisbury Daily Crime has an article up today that has started a bit of a ruckus in the Eastern Shore blogosphere over the changing of fire coverage on the westside of town.  It turns out that Westwood Commerce Park, now that it has been annexed by the City, is now under the SFD coverage, and no longer under Hebron VFD.

The reasoning here is that WCP is in city limits, and city taxpayers should be covered by the services they pay for.  It's a reasonable notion.  Would that it were the case that all cities actually provided the services their taxpayers pay for, but that is for another post.

Hebron wasn't pleased by the decision by County Exec Rick Pollitt to shift coverage, because mainly, it alters coverage and removes a fundraising source.  It's a reasonable complaint, but to coin a phrase-- the law is supreme, and the County Exec was merely following the law.

Of course, Runaround Sue had to do his part in his ongoing jihad against the SFD leadership, trying to stir the pot, and the accuse the SFD of being incapable of handling this expanded coverage.

What has really changed here is the assignment of the "first due" call box.  Basically, the change here is that SFD Station 16 is now rated as "first due".  Hebron VFD is probably second.  That doesn't mean that Hebron would never take the call-- in fact, my bet is that the County emergency communications center would alert Hebron on any call in the area, in the event that Station 16 could not make the call.

Believe or not, this is how it works, well, just about everywhere.  It's designed to provide maximum coverage of areas based on availability of staffing and equipment.  It's a relatively efficient system, and is adjusted on an at least annual basis as needs, demands, and response rates change.

In terms of the fundraising issue, Hebron has a somewhat valid complaint.  There is generally a rule that volunteer companies don't poach each other's funding sources.  For example, Hereford VFC (Station 44) can't ask the Home Depot in Cockeysville for donations, because they are in Cockeysville's (Station 39).  Since the three stations in Salisbury are also volunteer companies, as their coverage area expands, so does their fundraising region.  That is the real rub, as commercial enterprises remain very fertile ground for fundraising of all types.

Of course, this raises two big issues:

1)  Given that Hebron will, in all likelihood, respond to many westside calls, some accomodation might be needed to make sure that they do not lose that fundraising source.  This could be as simple as a gentlemen's agreement between the companies.

2)  Someone should really look very hard at Salisbury's seemingly voracious appetite to annex any property they can. I have been a long-time (well, as long as I have been blogging) critic of Salisbury's annexations.  I understand the idea:  the city is trying to grow their tax base by acquisition.  Companies do the same thing:  growth of revenue through acquisition.  The problem is, it rarely works for companies.  Want some examples?  See Recoton Corporation, Time Warner/AOL, ATT&T/Bell South.  The exception that proves the rule might be General Electric.

But there is a bigger issue:  local news trying to create a massive news-generating controversy where none exists, and an ignorant, self-important blowhard using a minor issue to draw more attention himself. In this, Runaround Sue is no better than a monkey flinging crap from a tree.