Tennessee family home burns while firefighters watch

[voider]

"Stood in the Fire"

[anveena]

firefighting should not be a "business"

It's in America everything is a business.

[Rixis]

The problem is you start a slippery slope when you do that. If what the mayor said in his statement was true, the City needs that $75 dollar fee to be able to extend fire protection service to the rural area. It is simply too expensive to justify extra tax dollars to extend fire protection to those rural areas, and it's not fair to the numerous non-rural people to have their tax dollars spent so the rural people have extra fire protection.

i have no children, but some of my taxes go on schools, i only put my bins out once a month but my taces go on the collections, i don't drive, but my taxes go on maintaining the roads

there are many times where taxes affect some and not others

[Azidonis]

It's what they are told to do. If they save the house, the incur fines and penalties well over $75.

The guy should have paid his damn bill.

[Gilian]

Surely a better solution would be this:

-Put out the fire
-Fine them $150 dollars, double the fee, because they didn't pay

Standing around, doing nothing? I bet a few of those Firefighters had a bad taste in their mouths. They probably wanted to help, but all because of some silly rules...

Why would they pay that fee? If they are already such assholes to not pay for services they expect to get then they probably won't pay that fee either. They don't live in a trailer for fun.

They could have helped. What to do next time when their trailer is on fire and they didn't pay again? I bet they also send letters to inform them about that they should pay or they can't make use of the service. It probably also happened multiple times before (not only with them) otherwise they wouldn't take such measures. But they leave that out to make it more interesting.
Work and pay your bills and don't expect to get help everytime while you are sitting on your lazy ass. I get my bills in the mail. If I don't pay I don't get to use those services either. If I don't pay for my internet they cut me off, it's that simple. If I don't pay my rent then at some point they will throw me out.
These people probably thought well our trailer won't catch fire so why pay.

Or do you guys really think that when someone is 1 day late with payments that they will watch while your house burns down? Right. I really do not believe that.

[v2prwsmb45yhuq3wj23vpjk]

The problem is you start a slippery slope when you do that. If what the mayor said in his statement was true, the City needs that $75 dollar fee to be able to extend fire protection service to the rural area. It is simply too expensive to justify extra tax dollars to extend fire protection to those rural areas, and it's not fair to the numerous non-rural people to have their tax dollars spent so the rural people have extra fire protection.

So no fast forward to the scenario where the house is burning, if you intervene and stop the fire, then nobody will pay the $75. Everyone will think that they can get it for free, so why pay the $75? Once that happens, there are two possible outcomes:

1) Without the $75, the fire department cannot make it out to rural areas, so the next time there is a person in danger in a rural area they are on their own (keep in mind this $75 thing is for property, they fire department would still intervene in the event of human danger even without the $75 as stated in the article).
2) The fire department continues to support rural areas and makes financial cuts elsewhere, either in their services to non-rural areas (where there are more people and higher chances for fire to spread) or in firefighter salaries.

Now put yourself in a firefighters shoes, if you help now, you save this one families PROPERTY, but you risk in the future a possible loss in another families LIFE, or you risk your own personal wages, in addition to already having a job where you risk your life.

It's not a simple world that we live in unfortunately...

Then they should fine people whose homes they save who did not pay the fee before. Or better yet, the government could actually fund the firefighters adequately. No matter how you try to justify it, what happened here was wrong.

[Adeodatus]

The fire fighters couldn't do anything, nor SHOULD they have.

As soon as one person stops paying, and gets away with it, more can do the same. Till you have a broke, and broken system.

Those firefighters need the money to buy protective gear, keep their engines running, if they are payed and not voulunteer, it puts food on their tables. As much as it sucks for the family, this is pretty much what had to happen.

Then they should fine people whose homes they save who did not pay the fee before. Or better yet, the government could actually fund the firefighters adequately. No matter how you try to justify it, what happened here was wrong.

The government (I assume you mean Federal) has no bussiness dealing with local issues. Period. 10th amendment. Either wya, they are broke enough as it is wasting money on anything and everything.

If you mean local, they are jsut as broke, for much the same reasons.

The government is not a fix-all remedy for every problem that comes up. The sooner people realize that, the better.

[Bolson13]

Ridiculous of course. People should be billed afterwards for the full amount it cost the fire department to go there and put it out since they didn't pay the $75 per year. The price would probably cover 10+ years so next time they will think twice.

This is just screaming for accidents. As it was sstated in the piece, the owners ran back into the flaming building to recover some of their possesions. What if the house collapsed? People died in a fire while the firedepartment was on the scene to roast marshmellows for their hot cocoa? That will be great for public relations im sure.

[v2prwsmb45yhuq3wj23vpjk]

The fire fighters couldn't do anything, nor SHOULD they have.

As soon as one person stops paying, and gets away with it, more can do the same. Till you have a broke, and broken system.

Those firefighters need the money to buy protective gear, keep their engines running, if they are payed and not voulunteer, it puts food on their tables. As much as it sucks for the family, this is pretty much what had to happen.

A system that lets somebody's house burn down in this manner is a system that's already broken.

[Aoyi]

This is the second case of this happening that I've seen this year. It sickens me. As someone who comes from a family of firefighters (volunteer), we'd never stand by and watch a house burn. This is one of those times where rules and morals just don't mix. The $75 is not worth someone's home. They could fine for the money and even a penalty on top of that if necessary, but a firefighter should never let a house burn that they could save.

[Gilian]

i have no children, but some of my taxes go on schools, i only put my bins out once a month but my taces go on the collections, i don't drive, but my taxes go on maintaining the roads

there are many times where taxes affect some and not others

Didn't you go to school? Over here you pay extra taxes when you drive a car.

You also can't predict if you will have a fire or not.

We are all already paying for eachother some people more than others because they earn more money or work harder. That doesn't mean some idiot can just not pay and get away with it.

[Grym]

I agree with the Fire Department in this case though.

They live in an area that needed to pay a $75 fee to be covered by the Fire Department, the couple KNEW this. Knowing you have to pay for fire protector, but refusing to pay, then a fire comes and you expect to be covered? That is another one of those retarded sense of entitlement people expect these days and need to have some sense smack into their head, oh wait they did.

And also in the system's view point: "if firefighters responded to non-subscribers, no one would have an incentive to pay the fee", which is totally correct. You are supposed to pay a $75 through your time living there, which will help make up all the cost occur when something do happen, when something DO happen, don't expect to just pay a $75 fee on the spot, the action taken cost WAY MORE than $75, it is expected you to pay that $75 throughout your time living there in order to offset when something do happen. In this case, the couple paid nothing, when fire happens, they just expect to pay a one off fee and had everything covered? And if they do make the "exception", it will encourage other people to not pay the $75, and expect to just pay it when something happens, will become a huge drain on the system.

Similar to insurance, you don't PAY when something happen, because they will just laugh at you in your face. You are supposed to pay throughout the entire time, because once something happens what they had to pay out for you is much greater than what you have paid in the past.

I feel 0 sympathy for the couple, they made the choice of refusing to pay the fee, and had to suffer the consequence.

[ZeroWashu]

They let a house burn down for 75 bucks? That's ridiculous. I would have helped them out and if it was that important I would have reminded them about the fee afterwards.

No they obeyed the law and ensured the fire would not spread. The couple owning the home let their house burn down over $75. Probably went for a couple of cartons of cigarettes.

[Deleted]

Brick houses can be damaged beyond repair in a fire anyway, as brick houses generally have wood and other flammable materials as other elements (like the frames) inside the house.

Just curious, where exactly do you live that you think that people can all have brick houses?

In Britain every building is brick/concrete etc. Chances are you won't find a wood house here even if you looked for a year. (They do exist but are incredibly rare).

It's always puzzled me as to why in America wood is the main construction material. Something I should look into.


ONTOPIC:

What state has America got itself into in that you need to pay a fee for the emergency services? Surely they are the foundations of what you pay your tax for?

[Ninjakiwi]

So, in other words, you have to pay "protection money" in order for your property to be saved? This sounds like the mob.

What I find strange is that the firefighters actually did that. Even if the department was lacking funding, I could never sit by and let somebody's house burn down like that. They'd have to stop me physically. Pretty ridiculous, if you ask me.

Lack of funding? What a sham! You know something is ridiculously corrupt when this isn't the first time in two years that they've let a house in the same county burn down.

[Gilian]

This is the second case of this happening that I've seen this year. It sickens me. As someone who comes from a family of firefighters (volunteer), we'd never stand by and watch a house burn. This is one of those times where rules and morals just don't mix. The $75 is not worth someone's home. They could fine for the money and even a penalty on top of that if necessary, but a firefighter should never let a house burn that they could save.

Maybe they already asked five times for the money and they never payed. Or do they really let your house burn down when you are a week or a month late with payments? Maybe they never payed at all for years.

It makes no sense to only have to pay $75 once when your house is actually on fire. No one would pay a yearly fee if they would just ask for the money after the fire.
They can also ask for all costs back. Let's say $5,000 but they are not able to pay that. That trailer is not worth $ 5,000.

[araine]

This high lights very well what is totally wrong with America today. But it is NOT the first case similar cases have happened earlier as well when the lack of taxation to even cover the basics of what a civil society needs to pay for. All the talk about the taxes being too high well they cant be that damn high if you cant even afford to have a fire department that puts out fires.

Stuff like this makes headlines all across the world and makes the USA look like a bunch of idiots.

---------- Post added 2011-12-07 at 01:34 PM ----------

The firefighters from 9/11 would like to have a word with you...

arent we lucky that the owners of the buildings at ground zero paid his share if he hadnt wouldnt they refuse to do the job than as well?




It is pretty obvious this system is NOT working, Seems like we might have to move towards more taxes to get this stuff taken care of. And if not going that route the least that needs to happen is that fire rescue will get a similarity to Lloyd's Open Form that is used in marine salvage operations

[Catta]

That would be true if they are usually for free.
But it's common use that people pay for the firefighters over there, the same way 'we' have to pay for bread in the store.
Yet you don't accuse the stores of mob-practices when they refuse to sell you food if you don't want to pay.

thats because bread isnt the same as firefighting - firefighting is a monopoly just like the army or the police force - whats next, you gotta pay a fee to have the police save you from a robbery?

[Grym]

Most of the people here seems to have the wrong idea though.

The fire fighters didn't let the couple's house burn down for $75, THE COUPLE let their house burn down for $75.

They are the one who made the choice of not to pay, their own bloody fault.

[Kronik85]

Providing the Fire Fighters don't let people burn to death for $75 then it's tough on the family but you can at least see the authorities point.