This episode is sponsored by TeamBuildr, yet
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558 with co -founder Sean Lake. Welcome to the
Behind the Shield podcast. As always, my name
is James Geering, and this week it is my absolute
honor to welcome back onto the show the president
of Pasco Firefighters, Dixon Phillips. Now, for
those of you that heard my original conversation
with Dixon, it was episode 879, and that was
about a year and a half ago. Now, around the
time of that interview, Pasco had just announced
that they would be transitioning to the 24, 72,
42 -hour firefighter work week. In this second
conversation, we have now circled around 18 months
later and Dixon is able to talk about all of
the incredible things that have happened since
they've made that announcement. So we discussed
the huge uptick in both retention and recruitment,
navigating some of the hurdles when it came to
adding a D -shift, the incredible annual physicals
that they have, access to mental health tools,
how this movement may open the door to reciprocity.
the near elimination of unneeded overtime, the
huge groundswell movement of morale they've seen,
and so much more. Now, before we get to this
incredible conversation, as I say every week,
please just take a moment, go to whichever app
you listen to this on, subscribe to the show,
leave feedback, and leave a rating. Every single
five -star rating truly does elevate this podcast,
therefore making it easier for others to find.
And this is a free library of well over 1 ,100
episodes now. So all I ask in return is that
you help share these incredible men and women's
stories so I can get them to every single person
on planet Earth who needs to hear them. So with
that being said, I welcome back onto the show...
Dixon Phillips. Enjoy. Well, Dixon, I want to
start by saying simply welcome back to the Behind
the Shield podcast. It's great to be here. Thank
you for having me. So we've actually seen each
other a little bit recently. We did a presentation
to the Florida Fire Chiefs Association. I'm sure
we'll get to that in a little while. And then
the Florida Professional Firefighters, I was
able to do a presentation on 2472 and you were
there as well. So it's been kind of cool the
last few months. We've actually spent quite a
lot of time together. It's been great, you know,
and it's great to just see kind of the word of
the 2472 schedule. kind of getting around the
state everyone's really interested in it so um
it's been a pretty good year absolutely well
i think there's no reason not to just jump into
that topic first and then we're going to go into
some other incredibly proactive initiatives that
you guys are working on i think this is exactly
the story when you fix the environment now you
can start really doubling down on the other areas
that need work so the last time we spoke um you
know you were earlier on in this process So I
think the thing that people are really hungry
now for is to hear, okay, well, if we announce
we are going to go to this new, healthier shift,
what are going to be the ways of us calculating
how to transition? And then are these departments
that are making this shift seeing the benefits,
seeing the improvements that we're told are supposed
to happen? Well, I think... First of all, it's
been a great recruitment tool, right? So we talked
about in the first episode what that was going
to do for us. We were expecting it to do. We're
in the process right now. We have interviews
next week to hire our last new hire class. It's
been really cool to see the amount of seniority
that has come in starting, you know, as a step
one firefighter from other agencies. We've had
a couple of 20 year, you know, lieutenants and
captains for their departments that have come
to Pasco to start out as a day one firefighter.
And to touch on the other part of your question
was the misconception kind of going around of
that we have to hire an entire shift. We were
actually texting back and forth about that the
other day. We came from a six -week Kelly Day
cycle. So you have extra slotted people to cover
your vacancies that are created by your Kelly
Days, whether it's a three -week or a six -week.
So what we did was we took those numbers across
all three shifts. and just applied them to d
shift then we're going to hire the rest of it
right which really about d shift was around 64
65 people there were the other positions we had
to hire over 100 to get to d shift but that was
just to get us to minimum staffing so that's
where that the large number came from you know
and i think that a lot of people they don't understand
that that thought um and they just think that
oh we have to hire another you know depending
on what your minimum staffing is we're gonna
have to hire another 200 people to staff a shift
And that's just not the case. Well, we've seen
a local union respond to a news article, a union
president saying exactly that. And what I've
found is that the moment you hear, oh, we're
going to have to hire that many people is like
basically saying. We are completely unwilling
to find the courage to actually move to this
proactive shift for the benefit of our people
and the people that we serve. It's so clear now
because the evidence is irrefutable. So this
is what really nauseates me. I know there's one
here in North Florida that just proclaimed that.
It's all over the internet. I know there's a
very large municipal Texas department that their
president has also said that will never happen
in our department, even though I know. We know
of their firefighters that have been trying to
push this. So this is what really nauseates me
is we are at a point now where the evidence is
irrefutable. The science is irrefutable. And
even now, two years of Florida departments that
are making the shift, we now have this evidence
to, like you said, you know, recruitment and
some of the areas. So if you're still digging
your heels in at this point, it really is a massive
red flag of the cowardice in. whether it's a
union organization, whether it's a fire chief,
whether it's city and county council members,
if you are still refusing to acknowledge that
this is the next step and it's going to save
everything from money to lives, then now you
have to look in the mirror. Are you going to
be part of the solution or are you going to step
aside and let someone with the real courage,
a real backbone, actually start leading their
people? 100%. I hate the word, you know, never.
Right. It's never going to happen, whether that's
because of you or because the other side of the
table, you just have to continue to have the
conversation and the facts. You know, they always
tell the truth. Right. So when we look at the
department in Texas that that you were talking
about, we I think we were on Zoom with them for
about two hours that one day, you know, and we've
gotten all their you know, we got a lot of their
numbers in their overtime is unbelievable. So
like we talked about with Pasco County, we looked
at our overtime numbers and in fiscal year 22,
it cost the county $6 million for overtime. The
next year it was $79 ,000 at a cost of five and
a half. And then we signed the contract, cuts
it almost in half in fiscal year 24. You don't
stop having the conversation, right? You continue
to find the ways that you can get it done. Some
agencies are going to have to hire an entire
four shift. They're like a 56 hour work week,
right? They don't have Kelly days. But if you're
in that situation, you need to be working to
just cutting the hours, right? You might not
be able to go directly to a 24 72. That might,
it might take you years to get to that point.
Okay. Well, how do we reduce the hours worked
right now today? and work our way to that 24
-72. But we have to reduce the work week. A 56
-hour work week is just not doable. We saw in
the health and safety bill this year that the
state of Florida passed the recommendation as
a 42 -hour work week. And that's because of all
the studies that you've put out, right? It's
not just because firefighters want to work less.
It's because science is telling us that working,
the shift schedule that we do is killing us.
There's a very courageous department outside
the one we just talked about that are... pretty
much about to go to 24 72 and it's phenomenal
and hearing them talking about the plan i believe
they went from no kelly and it's this is what's
so exciting now now we're having this conversation
of well how are you going to make it happen and
this this department does it this way and this
department does it this way and now there's all
this innovation and then these knowledge sharing
okay what was the stumbling block oh we needed
more refrigerators or you know whatever the thing
is So now these agencies are talking to each
other and you're seeing some incredible ideas
coming out. And we'll get to reciprocity, but
I think that's another great thing that's spawned
from this. But with this one department, what
they did is they are going to announce we are
going to 2472. And I think in this particular
case, I think it's four years, if I'm not mistaken.
Year one was hire enough people. Because as you
said, we need an entire shift. No one said it
has to be in a year. So year one was to hire
enough people to cover. a six week Kelly. Because
if you just go to Kelly days, as you know, I'm
preaching to the choir here, you're punching
even more holes in your staffing. So what ends
up happening in the last place I did, you get
offered your Kelly day first. So you end up working
that and that's time and a half of working a
shift that you used to get paid straight time
for. So you've fixed nothing, you've made it
even worse. But if you hire a recruit class that
covers those Kelly days at straight time, that's
year one, year two, now you go to a three day
Kelly. That next class covers, so now we've got
three days covered. The third year, they were
doing a de -shift with debit days. And again,
now the debit days are covered and the fourth
year is all in de -shift. So again, this all
stems from, if we say we are going to it in three
years, four years, and then what ends up happening,
I'm sure, is it's going to be quicker as it was
with you. that's when you get the recruitment.
But if you say, oh, we're just going to go to
Kelly or we'll look at it next contract, you
fix absolutely nothing by that point. A hundred
percent. You know, I mean, even ours, right?
Ours was a two and a half year plan when we signed
our contract, right? It was going to start on
April 15th of 2026, which is the, you know, halfway
through the last year of our contract. The recruitment
was just there to the point where we're going
to start it early. We're going to start January
25th of 2026. Like you said, the moment that
you announce you're going to 2472, the floodgates
open, especially if you're going to be a department
out there in Texas where there aren't very many
departments that have 2472s, if any. You're going
to be one of the first. they're going to reap
the benefits and then everyone else is going
to see the success that happens there. And then
they're going to fall in line. And like you talked
about, I think you called it the second follower,
right? You know, when we look at Florida, you
know, Boca has had the 24 72 for, I believe over
20 years, Boynton beach has had it well before
us, you know, and then Pasco and Gainesville
were kind of at the table negotiating it at the
same time. Gainesville started theirs earlier.
And now you just see all these other agencies
in Florida. going to the 2472 or at least having
the discussions and trying to come up with a
plan to implement it. And that's what you're
going to see, I think, all around the country.
It's going to be the first few departments that
change in their states where the 2472 is not
common. They're going to reap all the benefits.
Absolutely. I think that's the thing. I mean,
ideally you're, you know, you're a thought leader
in the space, you know, and you get, let's be
honest, you get the cream of the crop at that
point you do. And then you have the next group
that are going to follow along and it's still
going to be good. And then you're going to get
your late adopters. And if you're a late adopter,
everyone around you is now making that change.
If you don't move, then you are literally going
to have to explain to your people, your taxpayers
that continue to pay the same rate of tax. Oh,
we don't have enough firefighters now. We're
going to have to close the station. We're going
to have to shut down an engine, et cetera, et
cetera. And, you know, I was having a great conversation
with a police officer who now does background
checks. He was saying for every employee that
ends up being a bad hire costs about half a million
dollars to get rid of. So you think about that
as that bar is coming down, what are the likelihood
of mistakes, cowardice, coming in with injuries,
deconditioned, all the things that you're a liability
at the front door? What's the downstream cost
of that as well? Right. Something that no one
ever thinks of, right? You know, like we had
talked about in the first episode. You know,
my department was kind of like the training grounds
for everyone else. Right. Because everyone else
had a three week Kelly, you know, better pay,
better benefits overall. And when you start losing,
you know, your good ones. Right. Or your veterans.
You know, when you're having 10 plus year guys
go to other agencies because they're working
less hours or, you know, their overall benefit
package is better. That becomes a problem. You
know, it's a safety concern for the citizens,
you know, of that county or that city. And I
think that's what needs to be said more, right?
Like that was a big thing for us when we started
having this conversation. We were out in the
public talking about it and talking about, you
know, the amount of experience that we were losing,
the amount of firefighters that we were losing.
And the public rallied behind us, you know, that
they want the best of the best to serve their
community. Then that should be expected by every
citizen. Well, I've made this point too, and
it was in the presentation I did, you know, there's
that slide and it says, whose fault is it? And
it's, you know, everyone's fault. And, you know,
at the chief and then, you know, county city
commission level, I say, have you gone to your
constituency and said, we're going to give you
a tax refund? because the delivery of service
got worked. We're understaffed. We shut down
vehicles. We browned out stations, whatever the
thing is. Now we've got our ambulances running
into facility transports rather than being ready
for 911. So we're going to give you 30 % of your
taxes back. No, of course you're not. So the
civilians are expecting the same level of service
that they got 10 years ago when everything was
a lot better. So even at that level, it's smoke
and mirrors. And when that's revealed, your political
career is done if you are hiding that from the
people that pay your salary. Right. Well, talk
about our elected officials. I think a lot of
the reasons why they might be against something
is because they don't understand it. And that's
when we have to start getting into that education
level. And that was the things we were doing
when we were going through our negotiations and
even leading up to it. We started having the
conversations with the commissioners and explaining.
all the facts that we had you know the amount
of money that was being spent on overtime or
people coming in and leaving right the amount
of money that was just walking out the door with
them uh talking about our overtime hours the
the mental health crisis that's in the fire service
you know the lack of recovery the lack of sleep
the giant increase in call volume oh and also
a lack of service delivery and you know we were
very fortunate in pasco county that all five
of our commissioners you know they were on board
they supported it um You know, we added we put
more trucks on the road and then obviously they
supported the contract for the D shift to get
more firefighters into Pasco County. So but that
took time and it took education in building relationships.
And that's that's what really needs to happen.
If if you're in a if you're a local or a department
that is running into issues with getting the
approval from the elected officials to transition
to the shift, if that's the roadblock, you have
to build that relationship and educate them until
they realize that this is a no brainer. Right,
because that's. Truly, that's what I believe
it is. It's a lack of information, a lack of
education from them understanding it. And that's
the reason why they might be standing in the
way. It's amazing where the roadblocks are in
every single rank. I mean, you and I have both
seen this. People at the firefighter, engineer,
lieutenant level saying, oh, the 4896 is better
than 2472. And what you're saying is that a 56
-hour workweek is better than a 42 -hour workweek.
So firstly, I don't know how you got it through
Fire Academy with that kind of math anyway. But
secondly, for the love of God, look in the mirror
and listen to yourself, what you're saying, because
you're fighting against the very progress we're
fighting for. You and I also did a presentation
to the Florida Fire Chiefs Association. And I'm
not lumping every chief under this because obviously
they are spoken for by a group. But in response
to that, the the 42 hour. not mandate, but the
recommendation that was put out, they, behind
closed doors, but the email was given to a lot
of us, they publicly opposed moving to a 42 -hour
workweek. Now, these are people that work 40
hours a week, they go home to their family at
5 o 'clock every night, are saying, our firefighters
don't deserve to work less than 56 hours. So
whether it's the firefighter that's saying that
a 56 -hour workweek is better than a 42, or a
chief's organization that's publicly opposing
this move, those kind of human beings need to
be brought into the spotlight. And again, like
you said, educated. And then if they go, oh,
my goodness, I never thought about it that way.
I was wrong. Awesome. Carry on. Or removed if
they are, you know, truly a barrier, because
now we're seeing who are the real leaders. It
can be at the probie level. It can be at the
chief level. But we're seeing who the real leaders
are that are advocating for their people. And
we're seeing who the people are that are only
worried about their salary or their promotional
career. Yeah, it was pretty disappointing to
see, you know, the Florida Fire Chiefs Association
stand opposed to the recommendation. You know,
I think a lot of it is probably fear that locals
around the state are going to use it at the bargaining
table. You know, that recommendation came because
it's science -based, right? And we look at a
career that is... becoming truly science -based
profession, right? All of your fire engineering
studies or any medical journals that are coming
out, right? Our business changes every day and
improves every day. So to oppose the health and
safety bill that recommends a 42 -hour work week
because it's safer for your firefighters and
it will give them hopefully a healthy retirement
and life, right? That was extremely disappointing.
And but seeing that just makes me very grateful
for for my fire chief. You know, he supports
us 100 percent. You know, every time that he
speaks in public, he talks about the men and
women that work for Pasco County. He truly is
a servant leader. And seeing the things that
are said around the state from other chiefs and
other organizations, it makes me very, very thankful
to have to have Ryan Gwynn as my fire chief in
Pasco County. Yeah, and we had chiefs up on the
stage with us as part of the panel. Yes, we did.
I want to be very deliberate. There are some
great ones out there, but this is what happens
when you allow other people to speak for you,
especially in that way, because there was no
sense behind it, including the fiscal side. You
are also saying, I don't want to fix the economic
drowning that's going on for my city or my county.
Right. And then one of the other things they
said, right, was that we have 1500 vacancies
already throughout the state and we have fire
academies throughout the state that can't produce
enough people to to fill the seats as is. And,
you know, it kind of brought the question up.
OK, so where's reciprocity? Right. It's it. It's
unbelievably difficult to become a firefighter
in the state of Florida if you were a firefighter
elsewhere. And we're one of the few states. that
doesn't allow reciprocity or recognize pro board
and that needs to change if you're saying that
we have vacancies right now we know the population
throughout florida is growing every single day
so our public safety is going to have to increase
every single day this is an issue whether you
agree with the 24 72 or not this is an issue
today how do we solve this problem instead of
coming you know my mom always taught me don't
come to me with a problem come to me with a solution
you know i mean it would be very easy for the
florida fire station to advocate for reciprocity
And all of us get on board on pushing this. It
makes sense. We do it already for law enforcement
in the state of Florida. Why would we not do
it for firefighters as well? So I think that
most of the arguments, the reasons why they stand
opposed to it, they're not arguments. With all
due respect, I think most of them are bullshit.
It's cowardice. I mean, I'll say it. I'm not
an agency. It is. I see it. We're in a profession
that demands courage. Whether it's on a burning
building or the edge of a freaking high rise
on a rope, whatever it is, we are a profession
that knows what courage looks like. And if you're
going to vehemently oppose something that's going
to benefit everyone at every level, then there's
only one reason. And to me, it's glaringly obvious.
With the reciprocity, I think that's an extremely
exciting proposition. I know Gainesville had
talked about that because what we're seeing is
a lot of these departments are young because
of this retention issue. And so, you know, they
don't want to promote people too early. And I
could not agree more. I think we promote too
early as it is. So bringing in experience from
other places, you know, not even poaching, just,
you know, you've got someone in Seattle that
just simply wants to move to Florida, you know,
or vice versa. You know, being able to do that.
But this what also needs to be discussed is why
is there this this void? Because when you and
I were testing, you know, I mean, basically up
to about 10 years ago, I was testing 22 years
ago now. You know, you were testing against thousands
of people for a handful of jobs, 10, 20, 30 jobs.
So where's the question of what the hell happened?
And so, you know, but what we need to lean into
is because it was only 10 years ago. We are a
profession that used to be incredibly competitive.
So it's not like, oh, where are we going to get
these other firefighters from? Firstly, you've
got to say, well, how the hell do we fuck it
up so bad that we went from thousands to none?
That's on us. I'm not hearing that conversation,
the ownership. But then secondly, we can get
back there because we were there before. Because
it's not about stealing each other's firefighters
until there's none left. As we heal this profession.
This next generation is going to be excited about
coming back in. So there's a lot of people that
have certs that haven't done it that will come
back in. There's a lot of young people that will
actually lean back into the fire service. Now
they read and realize, okay, if I work at Pasco,
this is the work week. These are the mental health
tools that they have. This is the fitness standards,
and we'll get to all those. That sounds like
an organization that really wants me to succeed.
I'm going to go test there. So all these different
conversations, will create a U -turn. We will
fix the fire service again. But the first thing
that a lot of these older leaders have got to
say is, I'm the reason this thing's fucked up
in the first place. And so rather than say, it'll
never happen, or we need to happen in a year,
own your shit, realize you spent the last 10
plus years fucking this whole thing up, and now
let's start turning it around. But if you are
all about opposing... solutions without acknowledging
that you are literally part of the reason that
this happened in the first place. I think that's
another reason that we're seeing resistance.
Yeah, absolutely. I think that just goes to the
talking point that we just continue to do everything
the same, right? We have no change. We hear that
issue at the Florida Fire Chiefs Association
conference about the 1 ,500 vacancies throughout
the state. But what are we doing? Are we doing
anything different to fix that? No. There's no
recruitment. There's no recruitment to get into
the fire service. They'll recruit you to go work
for Enterprise on every commercial that's on
TV, but we have nothing to bring you into the
fire service. The younger generation, we all
know, is looking for a work -life balance. That
is what is happening. That's the transition we're
seeing. If you want to get people into the fire
service, you improve the work -life balance.
You reduce the hours. We extend our lives. mental
health and physical health as a priority, you
know, not on the back burner as something that
we'll think about later down the road. We have
to change. I think we're going to change. I think
that we do have leaders, you know, throughout
the Florida Fire Chiefs Association. I think
we have leaders throughout the state that are
working on turning this thing around. You know,
the reciprocity issue, I mean, Gainesville's
100 % correct. We're seeing it, right? I mean,
we're getting in a lot of seniority. I would
say probably around 40%. The other 60%, you know,
they're brand new, brand new kids right out of
fire school. You know, we're promoting, we promoted
a lot of captains, a lot of drivers to get to
D shift. You know, a lot of them, we didn't reduce
the standard of time required to sit. So none
of our standards changed or the classes required,
but you're seeing a lot of, you know, day one,
I hit my time that I can get promoted and we're
promoting them, you know, and it's definitely,
I don't know if it's a fear, but it is, it is
something that, That we should address in the
way that we should do it is allow reciprocity.
You know, a firefighter in Georgia, been a firefighter
there for 10 years. Why can you not be a firefighter
in Florida? To me, it doesn't make sense. Every
department has an onboarding process. You know,
for us, you come up to training, you do six weeks
at the training center. Then you have a two month
orientation out in the field before you get the
blessing to go out on your own. The department
is the one that should decide whether or not
this person can perform as a firefighter for
their agency. If you can't cut it. Your probation
is rejected and, you know, we move on to the
next one. But to ask someone from another state,
I mean, I've been in the fire service for 10
years. I would sit down at that state exam and
I know that I would fail it. So we're going to
expect, you know, 10 plus year firefighters from
other states to come down here, take the written
challenge it, you know, pass and then go take,
you know, the physical portion or the practical
portion. It just doesn't make sense to me. You
know, I think that we could streamline this process,
get more people in the door, get experience in
the door, you know, make Florida a safer state
to live in, make your counties and cities safer
places to live in, safer places to work. I just
think it makes sense. And I think that's an easy,
immediate response to the problem that we have.
And then we work on the other things, you know,
as we can move on. Well, I'm a product of reciprocity.
I was a Florida trained firefighter, got hired
in Anaheim, which arguably had one of the most
aggressive probations out there. So, yeah, when
I went over there, you know, we weren't big on
vertical ventilation in the fire academy. I was
taught to lay the ladder down and then walk the
rungs up and then, you know, stand to the side
of it and flip it and balance it with the halyard
and all this ridiculous things that we teach
in the fire academy. And I get there day one
and they're like, no, no, no, we spike it here.
24 high shoulder spike, you know, don't rotate
it, tie it off, get up there. Right. This is
vertical ventilation. This is, you know, this
is a flat roof, you know, pitch construction,
all these different things, bowstring. And you're
like, okay, I am so out of my depth here. But
I was a firefighter. So it was either learn or
get out. And I learned and I ended up, you know,
being at the right level with all my California
trained classmates by the end of the academy
and certainly by the end of the year. of probation
so you still have an aggressive probation to
make sure that if you hired the wrong person
or you know they could only you know get to a
certain standard in their state and maybe they
weren't the right fit for you then okay okay
you know no one's saying you let everyone in
but the piece of paper like you said that says
i can pull hose off a rig i can throw a ladder
you know i can um you know operate the extrication
tools like There is no difference between California
and Florida and Georgia and Wisconsin, you know,
so I couldn't agree more. And to allow the entire
nation to interact the same way we do as paramedics
and EMTs, you know, National Registry, I think
it would open the door to not only, you know,
these people will be able to test in different
places, but also knowledge sharing. Now you've
got people coming from departments that obviously
will be humble when they first get there. But
then as they get their time on, they're like,
hey, let me show you some of the things that
we used to do in Iowa. And you're like, wow,
that makes so much sense here as well. Let's
start using that. Right. Yeah, we actually just
sent our special ops team. They just went to
Michigan to take a trench class and learned how
they taught it up there, came back home and said,
okay, we're changing all of our policies when
it comes to trench. We're going to do it this
way because they're doing it the right way and
we haven't been. You're right. There's a lot
of states that do things differently. They have
different climates, different environments. We
can learn a lot of things from those firefighters
and those agencies up there. But I don't know.
To me, it just makes sense. We're going to have
someone who was a firefighter for some time at
another agency in another state, and they have
to come down here and take the minimum standards.
They've already proven at their previous department
that they... can do the minimum standard plus
and we all know that when you come into the fire
service we're going to teach you the real way
right we're going to teach you how to be a firefighter
not how you pass the minimum standards practical
test so there's things that we can improve on
i don't know hopefully we'll get there hopefully
we'll get there and get there soon Well, you
mentioned about the uptick in recruitment. Let's
just revisit that for a second. I had Doug White
on the show, who was a Tampa cop. And one of
his friends is working in your HR. And he was
speaking to him a few months ago. And he's like,
Doug, I literally need another person to help
me answer the phone. Like it's ringing off the
hook. So compare and contrast, not only numbers,
but you mentioned about experience. What about
firefighter paramedics? Because that's the kind
of golden nugget in the fire service at the moment.
So my HR director, the last class, she actually
called me and she's like, I want to cry. I've
never signed so many firefighter paramedic action
forms for new hires before. You know, we hired
a class of 32. We had 17. You know, that's unheard
of, especially in Pasco County, to have more
than 50 percent of our new hire class, a large
new hire class being firefighter paramedics.
You know, and a lot of them, like I said, they
come with experience or coming from other agencies.
It's made us better as a department. You know,
we have the morale has changed. It's a complete
180 from where we were three years ago. And then
the people that are coming in, you know, they're
excited to be here because they're working for
a place that truly cares about their people.
And not just with going to a D -shift, but with
our mental health initiatives, our occupational
health program, you know, our physical abilities
program. You know, they see a department that
actually cares and it's made everything better.
You know, I have my third man on my truck at
my station. was a 10 -year promoted driver from
another agency on the East Coast who's fully
Flussar, you know, teaches Flussar classes. He's
just an awesome firefighter, a great employee
to have and to think that we got him here because
of the transition to 2472. I mean, that speaks
to the people that are coming in the door and
the people that will come to your department
if you prove that you, you know, invest in them.
I think that's an important point, too. And I've
said this recently. Again, the taxpayer is unaware
of this in a lot of these counties, you know,
the ones that I know, like Marion, Orange, the
rig might pull up and in theory have a total
of five years, six years, maybe. Between all
four, I'm counting as four people. You know,
you got the probie in the back, the brand new
guy. You might have a guy just got off probation
as their firefighter. You got an engineer that's,
you know, riding up or so they've got two years
and then the LT has got three. Right. And that's
terrifying because if the most experience in
that whole rig is three, four, five years. you
have not seen very much, you know? So yes, you
have the training, you might be fit, you might
be competent, not talking down anyone who's got
five years on. But as far as a senior person
on that rig, there's so much you haven't seen
yet. You know, there's so many reps that you
haven't done yet. Right. And if I can compare
that to Anaheim, when I was on truck company
there, just the front seat had 40, 50 years,
depending on which rig I was on. So again, I
was a freaking wide -eyed. By the time I left
there, I had just over five years on when I left.
So full -on rookie still, but I had these salty
veterans to learn from that have been to decades
and decades of responses, EMS, fire, extrications,
whatever it is. So you've got all that experience
to lean into. So this is... one of the upsides
of this reciprocity of these lateral hires is
that now you're able to put experience back in.
It may not be experienced in Pasco County, Florida,
but it's still, you know, that 80 % of that experience
is going to be applicable. Right. They got the
reps in, you know, whether it was here or there,
it doesn't matter. They have the reps, you know,
we're, like I said, with us, we didn't lower
the time requirements because that was a concern,
not only from the department, but also from us.
Right. We didn't want to. to promote people to
captain with five years on the job. You know,
that just wasn't even a part of the conversation.
So we didn't, we didn't lower our time, which
is, which was a huge, a huge deal. You know,
we've had multiple promotional exams because
we had to wait for a group to kind of hit their
time and grade that was required to sit. But
for us, you know, you have to do, you have to
be a driver for five years. Then you have to
be firefighter for five years to sit for driver.
And then three years as a driver sit for captain.
So a minimum of eight years total service. You
know, I'm lucky. You know, on my truck, I got
a senior captain, 25 years, and I've been on
10. Like I said, our third man's got 10 years.
So we're kind of an anomaly, you know, because
you don't have that senior firefighter anymore
either. You know, and that's kind of been lost
in the fire service. There are very few that
are left. It doesn't seem like we'll probably
ever get that back because everyone wants to
get promoted and get promoted quickly. You know,
but you're right. That's another concern. It's
just another reason why, like you said, we should
have reciprocity and why it's important, you
know, to improve your benefits in your in your
agency. You're going to get that seniority. And
like I said, you know, for us, we've had two
20 year. They were one was the captain for his
department, one was a lieutenant, and then we
had a 20 year driver come over. So, I mean, it
works. It's important. Like you said, you can't.
It's just not safe for the people on the rig
or for. the citizens of that municipality to
have eight years of service pulling up on a fire
truck it's just can't have it it just can't happen
absolutely what about the money let's revisit
something i know we talked about this in the
last conversation but i just want to talk just
to underline oh so if we go to 24 72 42 out week
then we're going to take a pay cut so i will
leave you with that myth feel free to debunk
how you would like yeah so You should not be
taking a pay cut. I can't say that everybody,
you know, I would hope that your negotiating
team wouldn't allow a reduction in pay, you know,
to go to the 2472s. You know, for us, over the
three years of our contract, we're going to receive
a 24 % increase. You know, we had 8 % COLA in
year one, 7 % in year two, and then we have a
3 % step every single year for a total of 24
% increase. Even if we had no increase, our hourly
rate would still go up because of working less
hours. But no, there was no reduction in pay
at all. There are going to be people that are
going to say, oh, well, you're losing your built
-in overtime. Well, it's our belief, it's my
belief that you should get paid a fair and living
wage without having to work overtime. You shouldn't
have to work overtime to pay your bills. This
is a career. This isn't a side job. And then
there are also those that say, well, 42 -hour
work week, we're even more part -time. No, American
citizens work 40. We're working 42. So we deserve
to work the same amount of hours or as close
as possible as a normal citizen. But no, there
was no reduction in pay. You will, obviously,
if you have built -in overtime, that will go
away, but that's a benefit. And hopefully the
raises, they should offset that. Your hourly
rate should offset that. So no, it's a fallacy.
you agree to get your pay, your pay taken away,
but I don't know who would do that. So, or who
would have vote that in? So no, that's, that's
false. Well, with the money side, what I've seen
is again, you fill the vacancies now that, you
know, that unneeded overtime goes away. Cause
obviously a lot of cities still have day overtime,
you know, special events and, you know, call
outs or whatever the thing is. But you, so you
filled all those spots and everything's being
played at time. You know, you've, you've. kind
of stop the bleeding as far as a lack of retention.
You know, the workman's comp claims come down.
So the premium should drop their line of duty,
death payments, you know, medical retirements,
lawsuits from tired firefighters hitting other
vehicles or pushing the wrong meds. So now you've
saved your city or county millions and millions
and millions of dollars. I would argue then the
next cycle you can say, well, look, show me the
numbers now. So that's where our pay increases
next time. So this is the thing. The beautiful
thing is you've literally even created savings.
How many times has the fire department ever done
that in your own employer where you can point
and say, well, there's the budget for our pay
increase for this next cycle because we literally
just saved you whatever million dollars from
this new initiative that we've done going to
this healthier work week. Right. I mean, anytime
you can save them money, they're going to think
you walk on water. Right. And that's the thing
is everything that you just listed off. It's
not it might not be an immediate savings other
than your overtime costs. Right. But the long
term, which is how they look at things, right,
their long term savings with what you said, your
workers comp claims, your accidents, your workers
comp injuries, you know, et cetera. That is where
that money is going to start, you know, piling
up on on the savings side. It is an upfront cost.
No matter what, if you have a three -week Kelly
Day, you're going to have to hire some people,
right? You're going to have to promote people
and they're going to be making more money. So
there is a cost associated. But for us, the cost
of not having it was more, right? The $5 .5 million
of overtime every year, losing $4 .5 million
for 162 firefighters leaving in two years. You
know, those numbers add up over time. When you
take that and you invest it into just hiring
more people or lowering the hours. It's a cost
-neutral deal. And then, like I said, the long
-term savings are there with everything that
you listed. To me, it's a no -brainer. It really
is. Unless you're that one department that has
a three -week Kelly Day and has no overtime,
which I don't know of any, it just makes sense.
There's no argument against it. Well, even that,
because I've had a couple of agencies reach out
and they were like, yeah, we don't really have
the overtime. element to sell. They just happen
to be the premium department in their area. And
I tell them, and then the other example is, oh,
what about that department? They only run one
call a day or whatever. I'm like, it still goes
back to this simple concept. The guy that makes
your coffee at Starbucks, the person who's at
the checkout in your grocery store, they go home
after 40 hours. Why does your family not deserve
to have you home? after 42 hours. I don't care
if you're in a station, you shouldn't be sitting
watching TV all day. You're drilling, you're
training, you're doing PIO stuff, whatever the
thing is, visiting schools, but you're busy during
the day, you're relaxing in the evening, but
you should not have to be away for 48, 56 hours
when you are someone's last hope when they push
three numbers on a phone. So this also debunks
it. Why is the person that makes coffee tapping
out at 40 hours, but the person that will wake
up at three in the morning, climb into a truck,
navigate traffic lights and sirens, make entry
on a second floor window, do a primary, pull
out a victim, doff their gear, do a cardiac algorithm.
And there they need to work 56 hours. It makes
no sense. So the pushback from that point of
view is still, I don't care if you're running
20 calls or if that day at the station, you're
doing nothing but training. you still deserve
to go home and your family, the same as all the
other people that you're serving. Absolutely.
And you know, the same thing with the 4896 is
right. We kind of touched on it earlier is like,
you shouldn't have to be away from home for 48
hours at a time. If you're running one call a
day, it's still mentally draining, right? It's
physically draining. It's not your bed that you're
sleeping in. It's not your house that you're
in. You're at work. You're always, you're always
on, right? Like even in the station I'm at, you
know, I definitely, Went to a slowdown station,
which we're running about, you know, eight to
10 calls a shift. But we had luxury sleeping
most nights. I'm still up till three o 'clock
in the morning. I still wake up, you know, at
630 and feel like shit because it's not my bed.
Right. It's the sleep still isn't good. Your
family deserves you to be present. They deserve
that. You know, they sacrifice enough by having
you risk your life every single day when you
walk out that door. they should be able to have
you at home more times than not. I don't know.
I don't, I don't understand, you know, that thought
process other than just, it's, you know, it's
what we know. So we're not going to change, you
know, and I think that there's, you get comfortable
in the situation that you're in and maybe you
don't want to fight for that. Maybe you just
want more money, but the long -term effects of
working a 4896 or You know, working 24, 48 with
a mandatory overtime, you know, twice a month,
three times a month. You know, the long term
effects are so negative that to me, you have
to be an advocate for yourself. You have to be
an advocate for your firefighters, whether you're
chief or union. And you have to be an advocate
for the people that you serve and having firefighters
that fresh and ready to work every single day
with an adequate amount of rest. Well, you said
about the comments made by usually our, you know,
um, positions, firefighter, engineer, Lieutenant
captain, you know, it's part -time hours, the
42. Right. And I always tell them, okay, so you
don't want to be a good firefighter. Is that
what I'm getting? Because you ask your NFL heroes,
your NBA heroes, your major league heroes, your
UFC fighters, whoever it is. Oh, tell me about
the weeks where you don't sleep every third day.
They're going to be like, what are you talking
about? Yeah. No, we forge performance. Go speak
to the special operations community. Ask, you
know, how many times deliberately they just don't
sleep. No, of course not. They have strength
and conditioning coaches and sports psychologists,
nutritionists and, you know, PTs and all these
things. And then you have us where it's like,
oh, you know, if I work more hours, it makes
me a better firefighter. No, it fucking doesn't.
It makes you a worse firefighter. So if you're
advocating a 48 -hour shift, which, by the way,
the entire sleep medicine world thinks is insane.
I can't believe that that took off. I mean, again,
you talk about fucking, you know, insanity doing
the same thing, you know, over and over again.
Anyway, this chest beating is for them. It's
like, no, it's for you because you're too scared
to actually do what needs to be done to make
you a better firefighter. If you were truly a
tactical athlete, you would understand the need
for recovery after intense training. But if you're
just, you know, growing a mustache, buying a
leather helmet and thinking that you're Kurt
fucking Russell. Without putting any of the work
in, then you are just fucking deluded. You know,
if you really want to be the best version of
yourself as a firefighter and a paramedic, you
need the rest and recovery to get the baseline.
So you operate on four cylinders. So this mythology
of, you know, we'll just do more is bullshit.
Again, it's cowardice at my level. I never rose
above firefighter. I was, you know, going to
be the senior firefighter because I'd never grew
tired of, you know, making entry, cutting roofs.
fucking loved it but i also understand the strength
conditioning the sports performance side and
i became a worse and worse firefighter as i progressed
through my career when it came to my you know
mental acuity my injury prevalence because of
the way that we were worked and now i'm out of
the profession we need to debunk that ridiculous
cartoon -esque bullshit you know that comes out
of the 80s bodybuilding rambo bollocks that we
were all rain you know raised with and look at
the real performance gurus they're talking about
all things ice baths and you know mobility and
there are guns and that's performance world and
not to volunteering not to sleep for 48 hours
is lunacy and saying that you don't want to work
a shorter work week so you can spend more time
with your family and be recovered and therefore
a better firefighter shows that you don't want
to be a better firefighter period point blank
right i mean we're functional athletes right
and like you said there's not one professional
athlete or college athlete that possibly stays
up 24, 48 hours at a time, you know, doesn't
sleep, gets three hours of sleep a night, four
hours sleep a night, and then goes and performs
on game day, you know, at their peak. It just,
it doesn't happen, right? Science tells us that's
impossible. LeBron James spends a million dollars
on his body every year, right? There's a reason
why he's been able to play at such a high level
for that long. And we need to invest in ourselves,
our bodies. Our recovery, you know, another thing
that you mentioned was the physical fitness,
physical standards or learning the lifting techniques,
mobility, all that stuff. And that's one thing
that we're starting to do. So we have on underneath
the union umbrella, we have a health and safety
committee and our committee chair is working
with the agency and our health and safety chief
and just. Three, four months ago, they went around
to every single station, called it level two
training. They showed up with some bands, some
exercise equipment. They put the station out
of service for 30 minutes and they went through
all lifting techniques and just showing them,
you know, mobility exercises. We started an annual
that we do the fire sled fitness for our physical
ability exam. Right now it's voluntary. But what
we are taking away from that is, you know, we
had over 600 people sign up to test and take
it. A handful of them failed. So what we're doing
now is those individual individuals reached out
to the department saying that they want help.
And Chris Crima, who is our health and safety
chair, he's going now with a certified pure fitness
trainer on duty to those stations to work out
with those individuals for for an hour a day
at a time. It goes into what you're saying, like
you have to. We're professionals. You have to
be professional. We know this job is physically
demanding. That requires strength and exercise,
mobility, and the big key is sleep. You hear
it all the time, right? Eight hours to recover.
You need eight hours of sleep. If you're bodybuilding,
lifting, playing sports, whatever it is, you
need eight hours of sleep a night so your body
can fully recover and be the best that it can
possibly be. That needs to be the number one
topic of discussion in the fire service. It leads
directly to the 24 -72s. We have to have that
time off to recover so that we can perform. Absolutely.
I think this is what's really exciting. And I've
been very vocal about this, too. If we are going
to fix the environment that then creates a higher
demand in the fire service, then putting the
bar back up where it should have always been
is step one. And then having punitive fitness
standards should be side by side. And that scares
the hell out of some people. Are you trying to
take our jobs? But just to illustrate here in
Florida, as well, you know. Our certification
is called minimum standards. It means this is
as shit as you should ever be in your whole fucking
career is here. And when we were in fire school,
what were we doing? We were climbing stairs with
hoes. We were throwing ladders. We were dragging
dummies. We were doing the Kaiser sled. All the
things that required physical fitness and strength
when it came to fire ground movements. So no
one, no one can say it's not fair. to have a
fitness standard, a profession where you were
held to a standard at the front door. But I think
where it's really exciting now getting away from
punitive, and I've had this conversation with
quite a few coaches recently. If you look at
the strength and conditionists, the nutritionists
that did come to a lot of our agencies, if we
hand on our heart are really honest, they were
there with the intent of trying to stop us dying
as much, stop us getting hurt as much. It wasn't
performance. But what really excites me is as
we start seeing this revolution here in Florida
and these agencies are fully staffed 24 -72,
you've got people that are now really have an
environment to really start thriving and you
hold them to a standard. Now our strength and
conditioning coaches can start focusing on performance,
nutritionists, physical therapists. Like as I
give an example on here a few times. Next to
my station, the last place, was not known for
firefighting, was a 30 -story hotel. So three
zero stories. So high -rise strip on my skinny
ass is 100 pounds, 168 pounds. So I had to ascend
30 stories with 100 pounds of gear, high -rise
strip. And then when I get there is when I start
actually doing my job. So this is what excites
me. I've got a world class free diver coming
on soon. And, you know, so we're talking about
lung capacity, you know, efficiency of breathing,
you know, mindfulness, all these things that
are really forged performance. So getting away
from this fear of they're trying to take our
jobs and just putting our big boy pants on and
say, as a firefighter, I should be in shape and
giving them the compassion of like, just so you
know, the environment that you worked in set
you up for failure. So don't be ashamed of not
being where you should be. But the next conversation
is we have to get you back to where you should
be. And we'll have an on -ramp and it won't be
punitive initially. But we do as a profession
have to draw a line in the sand because I've
always said people like the phrase, would you
want you saving you? That's about me. I'm not
concerned of me. My thing is, how would you feel
if your family died because the rescuer hadn't
trained? And that is unacceptable. Right. Well,
I love what you said, right? Like we're, we can't
blame you for being out of shape. We've all done
it, right? We were 48. So you get home, all you
want to do is sleep all day. You know, you're
going to eat like shit. You're not going to go
to the gym. You weren't able to on your 48 hour
shift. And then literally the next day you're
back at work. Right. So we have set our firefighters
up for failure. We haven't allowed them. to be
the peak performers that they should be or that
they were when they entered the fire service,
right? So you fix that problem. And then we talk
about having a plan and getting them to that
bar, the physical fitness bar that we have. You
have to create a program for them. Like right
now, we're working on developing a 12 -month
program. Chris Kramer, like I said earlier, he's
our health and safety chair. He's developed a
12 -month remediation program for anyone who
fails this physical agility exam. And we're working
on it right now with the agency and kind of fine
tuning it. I would believe maybe not next year,
but the year after, I would see that possibly
being in place. And we owe it to our members
and to the citizens, right? The citizens deserve,
like you said, a peak performer showing up because
their lives depend on it, right? Our members
deserve it because being physically healthy and
in shape is going to increase your longevity
right both in the career and after and that is
so important um you know i love to see we had
we had a few members you know they've been on
been on the job for a long time spent a lot of
time on the rescues you know came on 20 years
ago got their ass beat for their entire career
working mandatory you know working 48 24s because
they were all paramedics um you know that that
were out of shape and i love to see them take
this voluntary opportunity to go and test themselves
and almost all of them passed so that it was
awesome and then every single one of them reached
out to a pure fitness trainer and said hey i
want to get better i want to improve my time
next year right we know firemen are all eight
alphas right you want to improve you want to
perform give them a challenge and they're not
if they're not happy with the result they're
going to do everything that they can to improve
on their own Right. And then if we have some
assistance for them, it's going to make them
a better employee in their personal life. It's
going to make them better. We know what it does
to your mental health being physically fit. Right.
I don't know. It's just we we can do great things.
We just got to get there and we have to have
people that are willing to make that change and
have the tough conversations. I saw a great post
actually. posted it's there on instagram um and
i've seen it before but you know this whole you
see alpha you know the people talk about the
wolves and you know the alpha wolf and the front
and all that stuff that's actually wrong unless
all these posts that i've seen are wrong but
i'm sure they're not the alpha wolf in a pack
actually walks in the back in the back to make
sure that no one gets left behind so we have
these you know fire service fitness gurus that
are filming themselves doing every workout. That's
awesome. You're going to be an asset on the fire
ground. But where I'm concerned is exactly what
you said, the people that are at the back. And
I've literally done laps with friends in fire
departments that are deconditioned, just walking
with them with a pack on, just trying to work
on trying to get mobility and maybe burn off
a few calories. But this is the point. It's not
about... slicing and dicing the people that aren't
ready today like some of us have managed to maintain
our fitness despite the environment and that's
very you know that's an important point despite
um but there's a lot of people that you know
added a notch in their belt every or you know
i guess it was added yeah got bigger and bigger
um you know with each year right you know and
so that's a real thing it's an acknowledged thing
the conversation is just simply as you said If
you're opposing fitness standards and you're
saying, I want our people to die younger, that's
the bottom line. I mean, it really is. So you're
saying we want to help get people back to where
they should be. And I think the 24 -72 is the
biggest first step of that. But then there's
also a filtering device. Because when you get
to that process and you've got these incredible
medics that you just talked about that have the
humility to say, I'm going to test myself. And
I want to get back to where I was. I want to
be better next year. And then you're going to
have some people that like, I don't want to put
the work in. And those are the people that shouldn't
be in the fire service. Let's just be very, very
honest. If you don't even want to get tired in
a workout. You are not the right fucking person
to be next to me on a hose line or make an entry
through a second floor window. I'm sorry, you're
just not. This job isn't for everyone. So there's
also going to be that element. You're going to
discover that some people now just don't have
the heart for it anymore. And that's fine. If
you have the ability to do a parallel to fire
prevention or something, great. But we've also
got to understand that we are a profession, that
lives depend on us, and our physicality is part
of that. And if you've set a standard, and people
just are unwilling to meet that that's an entirely
different conversation than elevating the rest
of the department right well i think you know
that statement right it it points the importance
of having the right person in the right position
right like you said you know the alpha needs
to be in the back and bringing people with them
that fitness guru and um you know our guy chris
he he's that person right all he wants to do
is see people improve like he called me the other
day he was so excited because he had two two
members that they passed the physical agility
exam they wanted to improve their time they just
went back up there retested and they shaved a
minute off of their time and how excited he was
you know when building the data out to show that
this whole thing works um and to praise my county
some more you know two three years ago they they
actually invested and they paid the IFF to put
25 of our members through the peer fitness trainer
program. We have 25 certified PFTs and each and
every one of them, they went and did that because
all they want to do was help, right? They love
fitness. They love working out. All I want to
do is just help the people that are struggling
to, to get better and to improve. You know, they
are, they're chomping at the bit to get this
program off the ground, up and running so they
can go around to these stations and train people.
It's. I'm so happy and blessed, like I said,
to work for not only this county and this department,
but also to have the membership underneath and
behind me that they truly care. And all they
want to see is our people to improve. But we
have to have that performance standard. Like
you said, it's unacceptable, right? It's unacceptable
for someone not to want to get out of a chair.
It's unacceptable for a new hire who's trying
to get their JPRs checked off. And they go to
a station asking, hey, can we go throw ladders?
And no one wants to go out there and throw ladders
with them. Right. That's unacceptable. We have
to change our culture, you know, in the fire
service. And maybe we can tie it to we've gotten
beat down for a long time. Right. We're a product
of the environment that we work in. But there
has to be a part of you that pride and ownership,
the reason why you got in this profession that
is willing to help other people behind you and
get better yourself. You know, if you're a captain
in the station, a 30 minute workout a day with
your crew. You know, that's all it takes. Hey,
we're going to go out here. We're going to pull
hoes today for 30 minutes. We're going to throw
ladders. You know, I got a 25 year captain and
we do that. It just all you have to do is just
your leadership has to want to be in that position,
has to want to do the job and has to still have
the love for the job. That's the only way that
you're going to. That's the only way we're going
to change. In Orange County and then the last
place I worked as well, this happened. I was
into CrossFit deeply then. And I remember when
I first got to the station that I ended up spending
most of the time in, I would do a workout and
it was just me. And, you know, I got to the point
where I even hung like a rope from the tree and
I had the gymnastic rings out there and all the,
you know, the CrossFit things. And, you know,
for the first few weeks, people would come out,
maybe they'd talk and then they'd go back in
again. But then one person joined me. And again,
second followers we talked about. By the time
I left that department, I'd go sometimes have
the day off and come, you know, I'm just going
to the airport or something. I dropped my car
off at the station because we were close and
my crew would be out there doing a workout and
the same exact thing with the next department
I work for. And I think that's just it is, you
know, build it. They will come, you know, you
can wait for mandatory fitness standards or you
can just start creating that culture in your
firehouse. And, you know, just another aside,
and I've said this a few times and it's not a
bragging statement. It's just illustrates. that
even the age thing isn't an excuse for lowering
standards. When I was 46, we're talking five
years ago, I was getting ready to test in case
the podcast, I couldn't sustain the sponsorship.
And so I took the CPAT as part of the fire test
thing. And I got 720, seven minutes, 20 seconds.
And then when I got back, I was like, okay, that
seemed like a good shot. And then everyone was
like, oh yeah, you just basically, I think it
was equal or beat. the record at the Florida
state fire college. And that was a 46 years old.
And I am prefacing this. I am not an Uber athlete,
you know, in my cross, you know, my gym now,
you know, in, in all the things, like I am not
the guy that wins everything. I'm not the, you
know, the misomorph, you know, Uber athlete.
I'm just a regular bloke that realized that I
had to train hard if I wanted to be a good firefighter.
So my point is if at 46 years old, My skinny
ass can get a 720 on a CPAT. Don't tell me that
10 minutes, 20 seconds, three minutes later,
an entire song on an album that you can't maintain
that standard. So I think this is the thing,
you know, walking the walk myself and just trying
to maintain, you know, the highest level of fitness
that James Gearing on his own personal path can
maintain. it's not unfair to ask people to hold,
you know, a reasonable fire ground -based physical
standard. Right. No, I agree. You know, it was
actually good. We didn't have a physical Jody
exam for a while. I think I took one my first
year and didn't take another one until last year.
Yeah, so about eight years we were without one.
Well, we do the fire sled fitness. I think it's
a great program. You know, it was awesome to
see also was the fire chief go out there and
take it and pass and, you know, and do very well
on it. I think that was encouraging to all of
our membership, too. Right. Because what do you
hear in the firehouse? Right. Oh, well, if we
got to do the physical agility exam, the chiefs
have to, too. I mean, everyone has said it to
see them go out there and actually do it and
perform. That's a big deal. But you have to lead
from the front. There's a captain from my department.
Anytime someone goes to bid his station, he tells
them, hey, I'm just letting you know we work
out for an hour every day, every shift. So if
that's not what you want to do, don't come here.
And then he's had guys that go to that station
because he tells them that. It's, no, I need
to work out. I need some help. I need to lose
some weight. So they're going there to get that
motivation from him. We have to bring the physical
standards back to the fire service. It has to
happen. Like you said, if you don't support that,
it's basically you're saying, oh, I want you
all to die early. We have to change the environment
first, and then we can raise that bar back up.
I mean, the bar should never have been lowered,
but we have to fix the environment and then fix
all the other things. The D -shift is a large
piece of the pie, but it is just a piece of the
pie. It's interesting because the special operations,
special forces community hold us to the same
standards themselves. And a lot of them, when
they get into them, I just had a guy, Mike Connor
on, you know, former army infantry ranger, physician's
assistant, but he's now in frontline mobile.
I think they're called, you know, working with
us, doing screenings and psych evals and things.
And so many of these people were just blown away
that we don't have a standard. Because when they're
overseas, our kind of military heroes, we're
protecting their family. So, you know, it's crazy.
And then the ocean lifeguards that I've had,
you know, I was a lifeguard myself, not in the
ocean, but open water and pools. You know, we
are basically usually required to requalify every
six months, every year, whatever it is. And if
you don't, you don't. You're just not a lifeguard
anymore. So this is, again, if you look at other
professions where the physicality is imperative
for your performance. Aside from a regular army
where the standards might be lower, but the people
that I would hold us next to are the special
forces because we're the jack of all trades,
master of none Swiss army, first responders.
The physical requirements are, it's an unspoken
rule. Of course, you'd have physical requirements.
Why would you not when literally we are, the
lives that are depending on us are... are requiring
us to have a high level of strength fitness and
mobility it's just that simple yeah we do we
do have physical fitness standards it's just
uh when you get out of fire school that's it
after that you're good um yeah it it doesn't
it doesn't make sense um you know but we need
to fix the problem first before we can hold people
to that line you know um like like i said earlier
The firefighter that came in day one is a lot
different than the firefighter at 10 years or
20 years, depending on the system that you're
in. So we have to fix that, improve our work
life, our home life, and then we can raise that
bar and you don't leave them behind. Right. You
got to help them along the way. You know, it's
not it's not their fault. I shouldn't say it's
not their fault. It's not 100 percent their fault
that they're in the situation that they're in.
Right. So now we have to help them get to where
they need to be. And if they don't want the help,
if they don't want to improve, that's a decision
that they're making. Absolutely. Well, you mentioned
the fire sled. My friend Rick Segrist is the
inventor of that. I've used it multiple times.
I do a firefighter fitness challenge fundraiser
every year called the 343 Hero Challenge, which
is coming up next month. And so we use the Punisher
and the Ladder Mill and the sled itself. Amazing,
amazing tool. But that's my perspective. Talk
to me about that and the ability to do the testing
with that versus the old way of a CPAT with a
bay full of equipment. I think it's an incredible
program. I actually went and took the class when
they came in to teach us how to use it. It was
one of the first people on it. It's a hell of
a workout. It makes sense for what we do. Right.
Every every aspect of that test is something
that a firefighter is going to do on the fire
ground. You know, we we got our times and we
had a study done and we got our time. I don't
know off the top of my head what the actual time
is to to hit it. But it's like it's over eight
minutes. It's like 815. You know, they take your
the men, the women, all your age groups, and
they give you one time. So it's not based on
your age. It's not based on your sex. It's one
time for your department of where you need to
be at. I don't know. I think it's a great program.
I like it a lot better than the CPAT. We actually
started as an agency. If you have the CPAT, we'll
accept it. But you're still going to come in
and you're going to do the fire sled. And you
do not have to have the CPAT to come work for
Pasco County. Every single new hire, before they
get their job offer, has to come. pass the fire
sled fitness. And then after that's the last
step, once you pass that, then you get your offer.
So I think it's a great program. It's a great
tool. We've seen, you know, when I was at training,
I was a training division for a little over a
year and everyone coming into CPAP, but there,
there were some struggles physically. And it's
like, is this test really showing anything, you
know, since we implemented the fire sled fitness
program, you know, for day one, when you're getting
hired. the physical standards have incredibly
improved. You know, the mile and a half run times,
just the physical abilities of the new hires.
I think it's a better program and a better tool
for you to use. Well, I've had this conversation
with a few people too. When you put that bar
up and recruitment becomes competitive again,
you get candidates that are prepared on day one.
And I'll use myself as an example. I was working
for a publishing company, you know, nine to five.
I would work out at the YMCA on my lunch break.
I would get to the fire Academy early and do
kind of like make my own, almost like combat
challenge before we started class, I would run
four and a half mile loop. I would do pull -ups
on the stone steps outside the apartment. You
know what I mean? I'm like, this is super competitive.
And when I get out of this, there are only a
few jobs available. you know, in this whole area.
So I think this is what's exciting is you're
going to get people starting to take it seriously.
And unlike what we're seeing now, begging high
school kids to come join or offering these huge
hiring incentives, now you're going to go back
to, well, you better show up on day one prepared.
But then to be fair and to really lean into the
diversity element, I think what's a great adjunct
to that are these fantastic mentorship programs.
where you give these young people a chance to
prepare for Fire Academy, to prepare for an entrance,
a hiring for a certain department, so that when
they show up on day one, you're not remediating.
You start off on the real work right from the
beginning. Right. We shouldn't have to work on
your cardio in your six weeks at the training
center, right? You should come in here ready
to go to work. We're getting that right. We're
filtering those out. And what's great is we never
lowered the bar for new hires going to the D
shift. Right. We have rejected quite a few probations
since we started hiring for the D shift. I was
just talking to my chief about it the other day.
We're not going to lower the bar. You're going
to come work in Paso County. There's an expectation
of what you have to be as a firefighter. We have
140 plus applicants every time we open. I promise
you, if we don't fill your seat today because
you can't make it, we will fill it in the next
class. So to to be able to have that standard
where it was, you know, five years ago. Sign
here. You're good to go. You know, and that was
just because we weren't having the people come
in the door. So the D shift just overall has
created a better working environment, a safer,
a safer county for the citizens of Pasco to live
in. It's just it's it's been an incredible tool
to to get the right people in the door. And we're
doing that. And if you don't make if you don't
make the cut, somebody else will. So. This job's
not for everyone. I've said that. I'd be the
world's worst accountant. You know, my special
ops chief, he always says, he goes, we still
need people to deliver pizzas. So, you know.
Absolutely. And then hopefully, again, it's a
remediation. If the bar is high and you go and
you try and you don't make it that time. If you've
got that burning in your heart, it's just, OK,
look in the mirror. What did you get wrong? Where
do you need to study? Where do you need to work
on your strength, your fitness, whatever it is?
Come back. Test again. That's what Anaheim used
to say. It was like, look, we're not saying you
shouldn't be a firefighter. We're just saying
that you're not right for Anaheim, which, again,
is an incredible amount of pride to be able to
say that. But hopefully some of those young people
had great careers in other departments or even
maybe. Tested with Anaheim again, but that's
what you want. You want those hungry men and
women just fucking banging on your door, begging
to work for you. We have one we just hired. I
think they were two classes ago. They failed
out probably close to two years ago from their
probation. It was rejected, and they did what
they needed to do, and they came back, and they're
already off of probation, so now they're on their
own for the next nine months, and they're looking
pretty good. You're right. It's exciting to get
those type of people in the door, right? The
people that they want to be here, they want to
work for Pasco County Fire. That's the only place
they want to work. You know, we've had several
that have rejected offers from the city of Tampa,
which is unheard of. We've had several come over
from Hillsborough County, which is also unheard
of. You know, we're pulling those people in because
of everything that we're doing, not just because
of the D -SHIFT, the mental health initiatives.
which I briefly touched on earlier. You know,
we have unlimited visits with the contract at
Tampa Bay Psychology Associations where any member,
you have unlimited free visits. Anytime you need
to go, you go. You look at the occupational health
program that we have, our DECOM program, our
special operations, the physical agility, you
know. testing that we have going on. It's everything.
We've raised the bar. We're getting the people
in the door that we need to get. That's making
Paso County the premier department in the state
of Florida, in my opinion, and making Paso County
the safest place to live. It's been amazing to
see how our department has transformed in just
three years. It really is. Incredible. Well,
let's take a deep dive in some of the other ones
that you hit. Let's start with the mental health
program. One of the big things that's come out
of this conversation is what I call the EAP Russian
roulette. The number of people that have been,
you know, had the courage to say, I need some
help, have finally reached out, been put in front
of a counselor who was completely wrong, burst
into tears, told him to get out, say, I can't
help you, or found someone maybe in the EAP or
outside that, okay, this is a good fit. but it's
$100, $150 for every visit. So talk to me about
that, the kind of counselors that you've got
access to, how you remove the barrier to entry
as far as the financial side, because those are
a huge, huge part of this puzzle as well. Yep.
So we, Tampa Bay Psychology Associates is in
Pinellas County. So St. Pete, Clearwater, that
area, they have several offices in that county.
They have a great relationship with those departments
and those locals and they provide those services
there. So that was how we kind of came in contact
with them. You know, our district vice president,
Rick Pauly at the time kind of. Hey, you guys
need to talk to them. Dr. Benson runs Timber
Bay Psychology Associates, and she's fantastic.
Her team's fantastic. They actually just opened
an office in Pasco County because of the volume
of our membership going to see them, which is
unbelievable to hear, right? Take advantage of
the benefit that you have. So the county, it
was an agreement that we came up with the county.
Where they are going to cover all the visits,
you know, we are self -insured. But they front
the bill. That's an investment from the county
into our people, into our members. So they have
unlimited free visits. You can take your family.
They do couples counseling. But. You know, they
they will deploy if we have a CISM, if it's necessary,
they will send. some of their team out to, to
the station to talk to the crews. Uh, and they
have a great relationship with us, with our,
with our department, our health and safety chief,
JJ Martinez kind of runs that program. Um, you
know, it's great. Everything is anonymous. Um,
everything, no one knows that you're going to
the visits unless you're telling them, no one
knows about the CISM unless you're telling them.
Um, it's. And the people are buying into that,
right? When they know that their business isn't
being talked about and gossiped, oh, so -and
-so is going to see a therapist. It's encouraged
in Pasco County. And like I said, they had to
open an office. They're talking about hiring
more staff just because the volume from our department,
which I think is great. Well, tagging on to the
performance side, I think this is what's really
exciting. Again, mental health access has always
been, well, because people are struggling. Yes,
absolutely. And we know, as you said, when you
reduce barriers to entry, all of a sudden the
floodgates open. That's a huge indicator of the
problem that was behind closed doors. But it
goes so much further than that. It's also forging
performance. I had a baseball player on Logan
Gelbrich. I've told this story a few times. And
he was talking about a flow state moment in one
of his games. And he kind of broke it down because
he's also a human performance coach. And he's
like, to get into the flow state. He said, you
need to have, you know, 10 ,000 reps or whatever
it is. You obviously got to have done something
along, you know, a lot of times you got to have
a high stress environment. Well, anyone who's
been on the fire service, any amount of time
has those two. And he said, and you've got to
have a clear mind. It's like, well, there's the
missing piece. So again, chest beating, you know,
mustachioed, leather herring, leather helmet
wearing hero. You're all about it's for them.
If you're not doing the mental health work. how
what you know what is the likelihood that you're
going to make entry into that that burning building
and you're going to have the clarity of mind
to really map out that room as you do in a primary
you know so you're not if you didn't want the
sleep you actually voted to do 48 hours straight
you think mental health is bullshit and now you're
in there and you're already shitting your pants
15 feet from the window because you're lost So
I think this is the other thing that's really
exciting is that there's the healing element,
which is imperative. But as we progress, it's
actually sports psychology, like getting into
the performance side. So now you're climbing
a hundred foot aerial without any problem because
you've overcome the kind of fear that you had
before. Your mind is calm and you literally are
painting that room with your hands like you did
in the academy. We had all those reps. So I think
this is what's exciting as well is that we're
going to see. healing and the mental health side
but we're also going to have performance if people
keep leaning into these tune -ups with these
counselors right you know i mean like the mental
clarity is you're coming to work too just a better
attitude right you're happier you're mentally
healthier uh hopefully your home life is better
um you know and talking about mental clarity
The divorce rates and the fire service, and once
again, going back to the 24 -72s, right, being
home and present. If you're going through a divorce,
I've been there, right? When you're at work,
you're not thinking about work. You're thinking
about what's going on at home, you know, what
you're going through. But yeah, to be able to,
at any moment, you pick up the phone, they have
a 24 -7 line, right? If it's an emergency that
you can call Tampa Bay Psychology and they'll
answer, they'll schedule you a visit. Either
if it's immediate, it'll be immediate. They'll
talk to you on the phone, get you in there the
next day. But you're seeing members taking it
as a preventative measure. Right. Not because
that, you know, you're having suicidal thoughts
today. Right. It's you want to prevent yourself
from getting there and staying mentally, mentally
clear, you know, working on yourself and your
family and just talking about the things that
we see every day. It's an important part of what
we do. I'm glad that, you know, I believe that
we're leading the way. You know, we have people
in our command structure that believe in this.
And that's what it takes to get this thing done.
What are you seeing as far as overall morale?
Not just the work week, obviously, these other
things, but, you know, what is that shift now?
I think it's fantastic. Obviously, every department
is going to have little bumps, right? And that's
what I would call them. There's always things
that might not make people happy. The most recent
one is we're moving the ladders in the stations
where they're currently at, moving two of them
to new stations. It makes sense. And the people
that are at those stations are going to have
to leave. Or sign a condition of bids saying
they're going to have to take some USAR classes.
You know, that was kind of a heavy thing. But
in the grand scheme of things, I think it's beneficial
for the department. And honestly, a lot of people
understood it right when you explained it. That
was one bump in the road that we've had with
the transition that's going on. But overall,
the morale is great. Our special operations team
is a big deal. We have a lot of people that are
involved with that, that are excited about the
expansion of that program. You know, honestly,
I haven't heard very many negatives, you know,
and the things that you do here, you know, they're
there. That's low hanging fruit or small things.
Three years ago, I would say, you know, even
the surveys that we did reflected it. It was
pretty low. The morale was very low in Pasco
County and it's going to done a complete 180.
I think it's the best that I've ever seen for
everything. You know, I think. The union, the
last several years, has proven our worth to our
membership. We've advocated for our membership.
So we have a lot of support there. The department
has done the same. We have a lot of support there.
Our politicians have done the same. You know,
when you look at all the programs that are starting
to come online, you know, it's great to see other
programs expanding, you know, other divisions
inside of our department. outside of just the
D shift, right? We didn't put everything on hold
so that we could get this shift done. We're improving
everything. Um, I don't know. It's, it's been
great. It's, it's actually, uh, it's, it's a
good place to go to work, you know, every day.
Um, so yeah, I think it's great. I think it's
great right now and hopefully we keep it going.
Amazing. We also mentioned occupational physicals.
Let's talk about those. Yeah. So we, uh, In our
last in this contract that we're currently in,
we negotiated that your occupational physical
is going to be mandatory. You know, before it
was voluntary and we only had it for a year,
you know, had never gone through an occupational
physical since I've been hired until my first
one with with our health department. So if you're
over the age of 35, you're required to take it,
you know, to go get the physical done every year.
If you're under the age of 35, it's biannually.
What's cool about that is that so it's not just
it's, you know, obviously we're doing the ultrasound
from the neck down. You do your blood work for
our special operations guys. You know, they're
getting heavy metal screenings. We've built that
program. Everything is in -house. We have a nurse
practitioner that oversees the program. We have
another nurse who is the administrator who is
a firefighter for us and also is an RN. We have
an ultrasound tech in -house. We have all of
these things there. We have the equipment there.
So you go through this whole process. You get
your blood work done. You get your stress test
done. You do the ultrasounds. Oh, and then we
just started offering MRIs of the brain, CTs
of the chest. And calcium scores. So trying to
improve, you know, everything that we can see,
you know, we've caught several cancers in our
members. They've all been caught in stage one.
No one had to do chemo. So it's it's been a huge
success. It's a great program. You know, it's
nice to just you go to headquarters and get it
done. You know, you go get your blood work elsewhere.
Obviously, your scans are going to be elsewhere
in Advent Health. That's our partner. But everything
else is in -house with people that you know.
It's fantastic. And like I said, I mean, it's
caught it's caught cancers early, which is that's
a benefit for the department as well. Right.
And for the county, like I said earlier, you
know, we're self -insured. So it's lowering their
cost, you know, a stage one just surgical removal
versus. a stage four or stage three, right? More
aggressive long -term treatments. We're doing
all the right things, you know, and that goes
right in line with our decon program that leads
the nation, if not the industry. You know, we
have a decon truck on each side of the county,
east and west. And one, you know, one's an actual.
Decon truck, 35 feet. The other one is just a
box truck on the back. It's just lined with bunker
gear. So every structure fire, they show up,
they're manned 24 -7, two personnel on each truck.
They show up to your structure fire, they set
up their tables. And while you're working. They're
on Telestaff, our manning software, looking at
your name, seeing who's inside, going to their
program, pulling up your sizes. So when you come
out that fire, you get washed off, you go to
the decon truck, you show up. They have a bag
for your dirty gear and they have all your clean
gear set up, ready and waiting for you. I mean,
it's it took a while to get the buy in. You know,
when it first started, obviously, it's the I
don't want anyone touching my gear. You know,
you want you want the dirty gear, you know, the
black helmet, all of that. And that's completely
changed. It took several years. It took one of
our members who passed away from cancer. Jason
Tucker passed away from glioblastoma. You know,
it really took his fight, his advocacy for the
program to kind of change the culture in our
department when it came to decon. And what I'm
excited. To see long term is the effects of our
occupational health program. You know, all the
testing that we're doing there, pairing with
the decon program, you know, making sure that
you're out of that dirty gear as soon as possible.
You go out of service and shower within the hour,
you know, to see how those things combined, what
that does to our cancer rates in Pasco County.
I heard from someone who I think had a mustache
and leather helmet tell me that clean cabs stop
grabs. Is that true? I don't believe so. You
know, I mean, we're not a clean cab department,
right? Because we have our SCBAs and our bunker
gear in the cabs. If you don't want to do the
clean cab trucks, I was talking to our logistics
chief, you know, it's about $20 ,000 to $30 ,000
more expensive, right, to have a clean cab truck.
But you don't have to take the gear out of the
truck to make it a clean cab. Give them clean
gear. Right. You give it to them on scene. We
have the micro units that wash your mask and
the air packs. So when you come out, they throw
the air packs in there. They get washed within
minutes. Don't put those in the truck. Clean
gear. It's a clean cab. But once again, it goes
into investing in your people. Right. A lot of
departments have that second set of gear. Where's
that second set of gear? It's back at the station.
So now we're getting in, you know, unless you're
throwing your bunker gear in a trash bag and
throwing in the cab, your gears and the truck,
right? Your radio straps, your leather straps.
That's a big issue. We had talked about it, you
know, on the helmet. Yeah. It absorbs all those
carcinogens. There's no way that you can clean
them. You know, I get they're lightweight. They're
traditional. I love the way they look, right?
But when you look at your long term health, the
the increase in risk that you're going to have,
to me, it doesn't make sense. You know, for my
my personal choice would not to be to not wear
leather. It's porous. Right. It's going to absorb
all that. And there's no way for you to clean
it. Met a gentleman at the Florida Fire Chiefs
Association last year who we talked about on
the phone. He's developing a new radio strap
made out of Kevlar because his wife was diagnosed
with a very rare form of cancer. That's already
out. Safer straps, they're called. Is it safer
straps? Yep. So, you know, the University of
Miami actually went to his home to find out how
his wife got this specific type of cancer because
of how rare it is. And they found it that morning.
He told his dad he would come home from shift.
He put his radio strap on the key holder in the
garage and put his gear in there. And every morning
when she would go to leave, she was eating the
English muffin. She put the English muffin in
her mouth, move his radio strap, grab the keys,
start eating her English muffin. She was ingesting
the carcinogens from his radio strap and directly
got cancer from that is what the study showed.
So, you know, we do not. Obviously, we have some
members of leather helmets and leather straps,
but we have department issued radio straps and
obviously helmets. They get cleaned. They can
be cleaned. It's about reducing that risk. I
don't want to do this profession for 30 years.
Two years into my retirement, I end up with stage
three, stage four cancer. And while that's a
risk that obviously we're all willing to take,
I'm going to do everything I can to lower it.
that risk right um and our department has invested
in lowering those risks as well you know in all
facets we didn't really touch on this when we
talked about the d shift but when you look at
the shift work in general right working overnights
you know i arc the international association
of research on cancer shift work is a 2a carcinogen
which means that it probably causes cancer in
humans firefighting is level one known to cause
cancer in humans. So when you add those two things
together, and when I was in Canada working on
their nationwide decontamination program two
years ago, there was a representative from IRF
that was there and said, in the following years,
you are going to see shift work become a level
one carcinogen known to cause cancer in humans.
So we have all these inherent risks when we work
in our profession. We need to start reducing
those. Right. The decon program, showering, showering
within the hour, reducing our hourly work week,
you know, ensuring that our that our members
and departments, employees and firefighters have
adequate recovery times. And then you have a
robust occupational health physical so that,
God forbid, you do get cancer or any other type
of health issue. Right. Cardiovascularly, you
know, aneurysms, anything like that, that they're
caught early when they're treatable. You know,
tired of going to funerals, you know, so we need
to change this culture. I don't know. It needs
to happen. And we're happy to lead the way. And
hopefully people's people start following suit,
you know, with all the other programs that we
have going on. You see this picture over my shoulder
here? Yeah. The schematic of the original leather
helmet. It's from 1937. I think one of the things
that we've got really skewed is history versus
tradition. That is history. That's a hat made
out of a dead cow. That's not tradition. Tradition
is camaraderie and courage and teamwork and selfless
service. That's fire service tradition. And what
kills me is people think, well, if I just stick
that on my head, then all of a sudden I'm a fucking
rock star firefighter. And now you have pushback
on the fact that, as we just said. The leather
version of that is completely, you cannot decontaminate
it. So you keep putting this carcinogen on your
head over and over again. And with the leather
straps, how many people do we know in a fire
service that have thyroid cancer? But where does
that strap sit on an EMS call? And I was, you
know, it's happened to me. I had leather straps
most of my career until Dustin Hawkins, who's
the founder of fire straps, you know, told me
about it. And that was kind of right at the end
of my career anyway. So I never got one of his
straps, but this push against it. If people are
like, oh, it's traditional. All right, well,
then why are you wearing a fucking pack? If it's
about tradition, you should be arriving on a
horse with your tunic and then climbing your
ass through that fire and pulling the person
out while you suck through your beard. It's not
about fucking. It's not tradition. So stop fucking
saying it's tradition. It's regression. Very
different. We are losing men and women to cancer
on a daily basis. Same with the mental health
conversation. We are losing, you know, what's
even worse, police officers and military members
who survived a military or law enforcement career
and then stuck a fucking gun in their mouth because
we refuse to do the things that are preventable
in the career. And it's the same with this, whether
you subscribe to the, you know, the more advanced
helmet that a lot of our European men and women
wear, which is just better. Hate to tell you.
You don't look like Kurt Russell anymore, but
it's actually for them, truly for them. It's
not for you because it wasn't supposed to be
a fucking fashion show. It's a service profession.
But at least even if you're going to wear the
old style helmet, which I don't know if you saw
that bailout video that went around the other
day. The first thing that happened when that
firefighter came out that window was his helmet
fell off. That would not have happened with a
European helmet, just so you know. But anyway.
If you're worried about how you look, you're
in the wrong profession. It's whether you can
do the job or not. But certainly with these leather
radio straps, helmets, et cetera. And I had Paul
Conway on the show long ago, who was a huge proponent
of the Euro helmet. His company makes leather
shields for helmets. So if Paul's saying it,
then that means that we got to pay attention.
But yeah, when you're again, that voice, I want
to do a 48 or I want to have my leather helmet,
understand that you are saying, I want more of
my people to die. Because we've got to stop that
bullshit conversation of its tradition when it's
not. Tradition are the things that make us firefighters.
The other stuff is just a costume. And Navy SEALs
are not wearing tin helmets, newsflash. They're
wearing the latest things. And our profession
has to drop their fucking narcissism and realize
that there is better technology ahead of us that
we can decontaminate after every fire. Yes. Yeah,
we have to be progressive, right? I mean, I said
it earlier. finally becoming a research -based
profession, right? That should apply to everything,
you know, not just tactics and how you're applying
water onto a fire and how you're venting and
when you're venting, right? It shouldn't just
apply to that. It should apply to everything
that we put on our bodies, all of our benefits
that we have, you know, the different testings
that we have, you know, and pay attention to
the different risks that we have. We know we're
going to have risk. It doesn't mean that we should
ignore them or that we should increase them.
Our job is to lower that risk. I don't know.
I'm with you. I'm with you. You just reminded
me of something. I had my blood drawn on Tuesday
because I had a company approach me a few months
ago, and it's a Danish company who have, in the
process of just proving it on human trials now,
a probiotic that will remove PFAS from the human
body. So I just had a PFAS blood test done. And
then I'm assuming they're going to send me some
myself and then we'll do another blood test.
But that's the kind of thing we're talking about.
We identify this in our gear. We obviously need
to change that. But then for the first time ever,
there's an opportunity to start pulling that
shit out of our body, you know, alongside not
using Teflon pans and some other things that
we know we're also getting it from. So there
are solutions to this, but it's not going to
work if I keep wearing the same PFAS filled gear
and I keep putting my leather lid on. So, you
know, you've got to, you know, it's exciting
if you accept the progress. But, you know, if
you do it the same way and then keep playing
bagpipes when you lose people. You're literally
part of the problem. The blood is on your hands.
100%. You know, that's why I talk to my health
and safety chief very often. We actually had
him on our podcast, the Firewire podcast that
our local does. And he's always looking at what's
next. And that's the best thing, you know, he'll
call me and he'll be so excited. He left some
conference or FDIC and he's like, hey, they're
doing this. I want to bring this testing in.
I want to do a study with, you know, this university
or this program. You have to always look to increase,
you know, what we're doing progress. Progress
isn't bad. Right. We hate the way things are,
but we hate we hate to see change. That has to
change. I don't know. There's so much research
out there that points to everything that we've
been talking about, you know, on this subject.
And like I said, I love the leather helmets.
I know they're lighter. They look badass. You
know, I love them. But it's there's no denying
the fact that it increases your risk to live
a shorter life. It's just the reality. You know,
I would hope that no one would be OK with that.
That's their personal decision. I just. They
have to make educated decisions. I don't know.
One day we'll get there. You know, just like
the D shift, like I told you, you know, we had
a lot of people that were kind of questioning
it. And, you know, we see it online in the comments.
Right. You know, one day they'll see it. Right.
They'll see the light. That's that's all you
can hope for. You just keep preaching, preaching
the word. And one day they'll see it. Well, I
shared this a little while ago. I mean, it used
to be exactly that. It was nothing but it'll
never happen. 4896 is the best. And then you
see a shift and now people are like, oh, no,
no, no. 2472 is the best. And here's why. And
the comment section has changed now. So I'm seeing
that shift. But the other day, I think it was
a post I put up and then an AI popped up underneath
with suggestions of questions that you want to
find out. And it said, you know, is, you know.
What is the 2472? I think what it said, dude,
it came up with everything that we talked about
for years and years and years from obviously
the health benefits to the savings for cities
and counties. So you can literally go to AI now,
chat GPT and ask about 2472 and the right information
comes up. So that's what's exciting. It's already
happening. Like this is going on. Yeah. Yeah.
Just going back to the decon thing quickly. One,
the aha moments I have when I went to California.
was I was a tillerman. So I was driving the back
of the truck. And in the doghouse, you can't
have your pack. There's no space. There's just
a steering wheel and you. And so you climb down
at the fire, open a compartment, throw your pack
on. And of all the years prior to that, that
I, you know, packed up in an engine and then
come out, you know, sometimes when I was, you
know, new guy, my radio strap was caught in the,
you know, the headphones, you know, cable was
caught in. I tried to get out and hand them a
seatbelt, whatever it was. And then we all know
you get a call en route from a medical call.
Now you're taking your seatbelt off and you are
doing 70 miles an hour while you're packing up.
It made me realize how much safer it was to have
a pack on the outside, not just the decon side,
but just that way you think about all the sprains
and the injuries of people that are clumsily
falling out of an engine because of their gear.
And it literally takes seconds to throw your
gear on while you're surveying the scene, while
your officer is telling you what they want you
to do. By the time you're all snapped in, you're
ready to go anyway. So this was another thing
about the whole clean cab stops grabs thing.
It's like, well, if you're jumping blindly off
an engine right through the front door, you're
a horrible firefighter. You know what I mean?
You're just another line of duty death waiting
to happen. So I really like. having the packs
on the outside, having had to do it as a Tilleman
on a truck company in California, because you
realize just how much more mobile, how safer
and how it's just not a big deal to throw it
on your shoulders when you get to the fire. Yeah.
I mean, how long can it take you to just open
up a compartment and throw a, throw a pack on?
Exactly. Yeah. It can't be long. And if it is,
we have a problem. Yeah. Right now, you know,
I don't see in our future, you know, that happening.
But, you know, at least we do have clean gear.
You know, we're looking from the decon side of
things. You know, at least for us, we do have
clean gear. We're washing our packs, you know,
doing the things that we're supposed to do. So
at least that's a benefit. But that might be
the one not tradition. but history that might
not change at least in, in the Florida fire service
for, for a little bit, but we'll see. It's not
a deal breaker, but I mean, even if you have
a wreck, we all know that that packs going through
your spine, for example, having a real seat,
you know? So there are a lot of reasons. Yeah.
There are reasons why too, but again, it's, it's
not the biggest fight by any means, but it was
just interesting perspective. Cause I've been,
that's how I was taught. That's how I was in
Hialeah. And then I go to California and I'm
on an engine there and it's still in my seat.
Then I'm a Tilleman and I'm like, wait a second.
This is, this is better. This really is. Right.
All right. Well, just to round up, are there
any other areas you want to hit before we close?
No, I think, I think we hit them all. You know,
I'm excited to see, see when this starts. January
25th, 2026 can't come soon enough. You know,
we had a news article come out the other day
and some of my members were sharing it and it
was like countdowns, 178 days, you know, on,
on their posts. That's great to see. You know,
we do, we did start our own podcast called the
firewire podcast, but on my past kind of professional
firefighters, you can find us on all the platforms,
YouTube, obviously your podcast app, Spotify,
you know, and just stay tuned. I'm excited to
see, you know, where this goes to see when it's
implemented, you know, and kind of. Face the
challenges that we don't even think are coming
that that will eventually show up. You know,
thank you for having me on again. I love everything
that you're doing. You know, you're you're a
huge advocate for the fire service in this movement
is you got your hands all over it. So thank you.