PETERS – Spend-happy B.C. govt should pay for KFR medical response unit
(Image: Mel Rothenburger)
IF YOU LIVE in the city of Kamloops and your taxes go up a little higher next year, a new medical response unit for Kamloops Fire Rescue might be part of the reason.
Chief Ken Uzeloc has requested the unit as a supplemental item in budget deliberations.
Uzeloc says KFR crews, who are ostensibly supposed to be firefighters, have been handling a massive increase in medical calls — 41 per cent more between 2021 and 2022, the last two full years of data.
The two-person team would respond to medical calls in an SUV rather than a rescue truck, freeing up fire resources to do fire-related things.
If, to your ears, that sounds suspiciously like what ambulance paramedics do, you’re not alone.
See also EDITORIAL – Rise in medical calls for KFR raises issue of double coverage
Uzeloc says not only are there more and more medical calls, it’s KFR who shows up first to three out of every four incidents.
James Peters is the radio anchor at CFJC, coming to Kamloops in 2006. He anchors the afternoon news on B-100 and 98.3 CIFM, and contributes weekly editorials to the CFJC Evening News. He tweets regularly @Jamloops.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
Chief Uzeloc has his hands full. A “one size fits all” firefighter is a tough shoe to fill.
Having a team of specialized medical staff to do “overdose” and “ambulance assist” calls is one thing but how many are needed to fill the shift changes every week?
Planners and smiling municipal politicians are anxiously awaiting the shovels being put into the ground for the PAC downtown. How much thought has gone into extinguishing battery fires in electric vehicles and that happening in an underground parking facility that has a few hundred people sitting atop the parkade?
Having staff trained to do medical calls might be a challenge. Having those people also serve as regular firefighters trying to tackle all the other stuff changes in technology is bringing seems to be more than what a firefighter should be expected to do.
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So let me get this straight, you’re whining about a provincial gov’t which spends too much because they’re not spending enough? Wow, that’s a well thought out thesis, can’t argue with that type of logic. Hey everybody James has solved the problem, the prov gov’t will increase the taxes for the entire prov so the cities can get quicker ambulatory service and the small towns will be ponying up more $ to help pay for it, yea!
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The KFR already has pickup trucks which may already have what’s needed for quick response. They also have the manpower too. So I am a bit suspicious as to why close to a million additional dollars need to be spent.
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Another piece of shrapnel hitting taxpayers as a result of out of control drug abuse encouraged by the BC government, municipal councils, service provider partners, activist judges and some health officials.
A very large portion of these calls are in response to overdoses or drug-related calls. It’s madness that we spend this kind of money to drive around at all hours and inject addicts with naloxone so that they can rise up to do it all again the next day.
This is a bandaid solution that does nothing to address the underlying cause. Firefighters have been turned into the Uber Eats of addiction services.
If you like paying for this kind of thing, if you like your fire and ambulance services spending the majority of time and resource on drug addicts, don’t write your MLA, local council, Premier or health minister. Don’t vocalize your disproved of an endless sea of your tax dollars flowing toward addiction maintenance.
They say we shouldn’t stigmatize drug addicts. OK then, let’s stigmatize the enablers instead. It takes a few minutes to send an email, but the more that do, the more those in charge will clue in that people have had enough of the BS. It’s only until they feel the pressure of a political loss, will they stop funding the carnival of horrors they have created.
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