07/05/2005 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Special Council Minutes of 7/5/2005 be heazd from-that is our City Council. Of these municipalities, there aze five v subject matter experts and only five-and these are the fire chiefs. Council should not be confused by others that may have interests that go beyond the technical merits of this initiative. Of the five municipalities, all five chiefs see the benefit to this program. So, he asks that Council weigh not so much what they have heard of let's not change, we're afraid. Weigh the reality. Don't listen when people come in and say we don't need this, it's not necessary when a few days ago they were saying, I was all alone, the other dispatcher was gone to lunch and there was no one there to help me, and I was very overworked. Listen to that. Listen to the fact and the reality. He wants the citizens to judge us. He wants the citizens to look and two years down the road this is going to be a success or this is going to be a failure. If it's a failure, he wants them to say, Mayor O'Grady you were wrong. But, if it's a success, he wants them to hold everyone responsible. And either we will be there joining in that success, or we will be there on the outside looking in. We are the best in the west right now and the day that CDC goes active, we will be second best. • Councilman Nashar commented, regarding what the Mayor said about the dispatcher handling the situation by herself, he would certainly like to have that person in dispatch whenever he would have to call. She did an excellent job in responding to that by herself. He thinks all of our dispatch people are very well qualified to handle situations like that. Mayor O'Grady said he concurred with everything Mr. Nashaz said. The dispatcher did a spectacular job. By listening to her, she would have preferred to have a second person there. But that other person was out to lunch. At no additional cost to our taxpayers for two years, we can have two additional persons ready to help her. So we're not missing anything. We're not losing anything. That person that you want there is still there. Now, she has back-up. That's the difference. • Charles Dial, 27959 Gardenia, listened with considerable attentiveness to the debate on both sides and it seems both sides have some very strong, compelling arguments. He thinks the Mayor is absolutely right that we're going to have to move in this direction. But he will also say others have some very legitimate points that need to be thought through and addressed. He recently had an occasion to call 911, and the call was handled very well. Because of the security situation in which we live, the feral government is probably going to mandate something like this on to everybody. He thinks it's better that we should be working in an intelligent, sensible way toward it. He would urge both sides to take time to listen to each other more, take into account the concerns of the other side and try to pull this together for everyone's benefit. Councilman Miller made a motion to adopt Resolution 2005-90. The motion was seconded by Councilman McKay. Roil call: Miller, no, with comment. There will be a time when central dispatch is the right thing for North 4hnsted, and perhaps there will be a time when regional fire fighting is appropriate for North Olmsted, but now is not the time. It is undisputed that it takes at least two and perhaps three years to get a dispatcher up to speed and able to handle the issues in the way that we have and beyond. Our dispatchers generally average about 15 years experience. He would much prefer to have one 15-year experienced dispatcher than several one or two or even a half year experienced dispatchers handling his next emergency. So there is something to be said for experience and, in fact, the case was handled properly. It shows the strength of our