The mayor held a neighborhood meeting at The Home Course on Saturday. Another meeting will happen tonight at DuPont's EOC. Hope to see you there.
One person made several comments on Saturday. Listen here at this link:
http://goo.gl/6gmpW
Can you help identify who he is? If yes, please post a comment, here.
Citizens working together for a better community in DuPont, Washington
We knew we were in trouble when the Mayor was asked how many fire fighters were currently on staff and he didn't know.
ReplyDeleteThis morning on my way to work I saw several VOTE YES people on the corner holding signs. I couldn't help but get even more angry. If they are so concerned about "saving the 3 firefighters" why aren't they holding fundraisers instead of signs?
Every time I see them out there (which has been every morning for several weeks now) I can't help but think how much money they could have raised if they had spent the time doing something useful.
Most if not all communities have had to scale back Police/Fire and have had to do with what they have. We live in this community full of military professionals who all have some kind of emergency training. Here's an idea...let's get some volunteers to help the fire and police department. What a concept!
Taxing the good people of DuPont is really a shame. We are voting NO on Prop 1
Exactly, Heather. We're still trying to track down the man who suggested the mayor step down. Are you attending the neighborhood meeting tonight's?
ReplyDeleteI think we saw somewhere that there is one on the 18th? May I get the time and location for the meeting tonight? If you can't post here, please e-mail to officialheatherrobinson@yahoo.com
ReplyDeleteThank you.
It is not cost effective to have volunteer police and fire staffing. It takes 4 volunteers to equal one full time employee. The training is expensive and the drop out ratio is very high. They tried to hang onto the volunteer program for years and it just didn't work.
ReplyDelete• 86 percent of fire departments are all or mostly volunteer; they protect 39 percent of the population.
ReplyDelete• Of the 1.15 million firefighters in the United States, 812,150 are volunteers.
• 94 percent of volunteer firefighters serve communities with fewer than 25,000 residents.
• There are 21,235 all volunteer and 4,830 mostly volunteer fire departments in the United States.
• Volunteer firefighters save local communities $37.2 billion per year in taxes.
• 72 U.S. firefighters died in the line of duty in 2010; 44 were volunteers.
Yes, that's all true but it didn't work here because we are a transient community. They would get the volunteers, but they moved away within a year or quit because of time issues and it was not cost effective. The Community Finance Committee reviewed this issue at length and it is not a sensible option for DuPont. Have a conversation with Chief Hull or Assistant Chief Cooper if you have any questions about it.
ReplyDelete:-( well that sucks! We just want to help make it better. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteI wanted to ask a non Prop 1 related question that you may or may not know, why aren't there any grocery stores here? I heard a rumor that Trader Joe's were interested in buying the land near McDonald's? Is that true? Is that wrong? Can anyone shed some light as to why we have to drive several miles in either direction to shop? Or maybe there is a website posted that can answer those type of questions? Thank you.
ReplyDeleteYes, we all want to see improvements...that's why we started TBD.
ReplyDeleteAs for the grocery store, the most popular answer is that we're too close to JBLM and their commissary. Only 40% of our population has JBLM access so that response doesn't make sense to me. I grew up in Port Orchard when the population was 4950 and we had four grocery stores. They were always busy and they remain open to this day, so I'm not sure how valid the population argument is.
My personal opinion is that it has more to do with the red tape and delays through the city and/or property developers. Mayor Grayum is the first mayor we've had who will candidly discuss the issue whereas our previous mayors would only release "statements" about it. I know he has made it a priority to bring businesses to DuPont and a grocery store is at the top of everyone's list. After 13 years, I don't think about it as much anymore...but it sure would be nice!