During this economic downturn, many fire and ems departments are scrambling to compensate for worn apparatus that should be replaced, yet they are being kept in service. The costs of new firetrucks and ambulances are high and tax receipts are low right now. Some fire chiefs look for creative solutions to get their front-line trucks replaced and the North Attleboro, Massachusetts, Fire Chief Peter Lamb offers a good example of how this can be done.
North Attleboro firefighters operate two ambulances and both of them were well-worn and needed replacement. In fact, one of them was spending more time in the shop than it was in the firehouse and had literally become unusable. This led to the NAFD having to borrow ambulances from other towns constantly and is not a good way to do business.
At a Town Meeting, the voters approved the expenditure of up to $250,000 for a new ambulance to replace the worn-out unit. Then Chief Lamb decided to do some more checking around, rather than just take the money and run, and he found out that if he scaled down the minimum specs for their unit to a lighter-duty truck that had a patient compartment that is only 5 inches shorter than the first choice, he could get two brand-new ambulances for a total of $300,000. Taking this information back to the October Town Meeting, the voters fortunately saw the wisdom in his proposal and appropriated the additional $50 K to purchase the pair.
The first 2010 Ford / Horton ambulance was delivered this week and the other unit is expected to arrive next month.
Sun Chronicle photo by Tom Maguire
Chief Lamb’s checking further on his options provide a lesson in how to be creative and open-minded when it comes to getting more for the dollar these days. And you can also expect that truck manufacturers like Ford are offering sizeable dealer discounts to move their backlog of cab-and-chassis’ these days. This discount will be passed along to the purchasers and should show up in proposals that are offered. So get creative and look for solutions that are a little different from “the way we’ve always done it.”
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There are lot of games scheduled for tomorrow in the National Hockey League, many of them matchups that will be generating a lot of fan excitement. Let’s get ready for the weekend by checking out the latest “Plays of the Week” video from the NHL.
Then we’ll get ready for today by checking out this equipment. I’ll make sure there’s plenty of coffee, then we’ll meet back in the day room.
