NYC Consolidation Still Being Debated

Just two months before New York City’s fire dispatchers are scheduled to move from their borough-based comm centers to a downtown center and Bronx-based backup, criticism is being raised about the plan, sparking more debate. Mayor Michael Bloomberg and fire officials say the new center is ready and that operations will be improved by the move. But Staten Island politicians are raising the issue of local control and knowledge–they say dispatchers miles away won’t have the intimate and detailed knowledge of dispatchers who are within the borough for which they are dispatching. David Rosenzweig, president of the Uniformed Fire Alarm Dispatchers Benevolent Association, says that police dispatchers are not competent to handle telephone calls involving fires, and received just six hours of training, compared to the 90-days received by fire dispatchers. A city council member representing Staten Island has introduced a bill to keep dispatchers within their own boroughs, and a rally was held outside the Staten Island fire comm center to protest the move. Read more here, and watch a TV report here.