"Preparedness"

American fire departments have spent an inordinate amount of training time preparing for the next big terror attack. As well-intentioned as this process has been, I can’t help but think this dramatic and enthusiastic shift in training time and dollars is a bad idea when taken to this extreme.

For one thing, WMD and anti-terror preparations siphon time from training in other aspects of the fire service’s core mission. Since 9/11, my city has experienced a grand total of zero terrorist incidents, but we have responded to thousands of fires and tens of thousands of first aid calls. The federal government has been generous in providing money and opportunities for WMD training, but it hasn’t found a way to provide fire departments with more time in the day. Time spent training in "special operations" is time withheld from "standard operations."

Even more frustrating is the fact that as the feds are opening the coffers and providing resources in this narrow area of WMD preparedness, municipalities like mine are closing fire companies and reducing response capabilities due to a lack of available cash. Does anyone really believe our citizens are safer with fewer firefighters, even if fire personnel have had rudimentary WMD training and can talk in the newspeak of homeland security jargon?

In these times of economic challenge, the allure of the “free money” available for anti-terror training has been too much for most of us to resist, despite the fact that our real emphasis ought to be on how to continue performing our core mission in the light of downsizing and budget cutbacks.

One of the ironies is that evey WMD instructor I’ve met acknowledges that a terrorist event of any significant magnitude is likely to overwhelm local resources very quickly. So…. Why do we put so much time and effort – and money – into preparing for something we know we won't be able to handle, anyway? When will we return to the wise practice of investing the bulk of our efforts into maintaining and improving our competence in garden variety fire suppression, EMS and emergency preparedness?