TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Hernando Today

Report Puts Commissioners On Hot Seat

ADVERTISEMENT

By JOHN HERBERT

Published: January 9, 2008

A few months ago, I witnessed a two-car accident at the corner of Elgin and Barclay on the edge of Spring Hill. Fortunately, there were no serious injuries, but both cars were so badly chewed up, they needed to be pushed off to the side of the road.
As at most collisions, a fire rescue vehicle provided the extra muscle, along with a couple of units from the county sheriff's department. The emergency vehicle was from "Spring Hill Fire Rescue," the emblem on the fire engine door read. "Something's wrong here," I thought. "Hernando County has one of these meat wagons just a mile up the street. The closest Spring Hill station is at least four miles away, on Spring Hill Drive."
It was a jurisdictional conflict that had been smoothed over so that Spring Hill first responders could cover a Spring Hill incident, even though a county station was much closer. The result could have been ugly; this time, it wasn't. But my conclusion was telling. "My God," I mumbled, "Why can't these guys (Spring Hill and Brooksville) get together?"
An independent consultant has now recognized the potential conflict and recommended that Hernando County's three fire rescue districts merge into a single operation. Under the "bigger is better" rubric, full-scale merger not only saves big bucks, it makes plenty of common sense.
Judging from the howls coming from political heavyweights around here, we seem to have already forgotten that, just a few months ago, several hundred county residents assembled to demand greater cost savings and bigger tax cuts out of Brooksville.
Yet, when confronted with recommendations that could save the county $700,000 a year through a total merger of fire rescue units and structural alterations, the most we could manage was a ho-hum, if not outright opposition.
Two Brooksville city councilors ventured that, while the cost savings of a merger were attractive, the benefits of an effective status quo were probably worth the current level of spending.
They were commenting on the consultant's finding that it seldom took the Brooksville City Fire Rescue more than three minutes to show up after an emergency call.
The correct response to the merger recommendations should be that we take the best of all three operations — Hernando County, Brooksville and Spring Hill — and weave them new common goals.
The main problem, from where I sit and observe all the fancy footwork around a merger, is that the recommendations would step on too many toes. We have issues like relative pay scales and jurisdictional disputes trumping the logical.
One issue illustrates: We now have three fire chiefs for a single small county. We need only one, a savings potential of two executive-level salaries. There are many other unnecessary duplications listed in the 500-page consultant's report.
One county-wide chief would not necessarily have to have earned hash marks as a firefighter but would have to be able to set goals and strategies, exercise solid judgment and communicate competently. He, or she, exists, somewhere.
Another contentious point is that the Hernando County commissioners seem content to toss the merger issue back to the voters in a November referendum. Maybe we don't need the commissioners. We pay them some $60,000 a year, each, to make some tough decisions for us. But, their attitude is, simply, "Our hands are tied."
Well, untie them, make some difficult choices or get out of Brooksville.

A regular columnist for Hernando Today, Herbert lives in Spring Hill.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT