Fiery Friday

219 Amity Street this morning

While many of us townies were enjoying the Rotary sponsored Community Fair, which lit up the night sky like a giant Christmas tree, AFD was busy battling a blaze on a large rental two blocks away that most folks mistake for a rooming house at the corner of Amity and Lincoln Avenue.

Amherst Community Fair Town Common last night

In addition to this home turf battle AFD also assisted via mutual aid their brothers and sisters in Northampton for a potentially catastrophic fire at a senior care facility and a structure in Leverett that was "fully engulfed" when our Quint (Engine 2) arrived to assist.

 The Quint on scene Shutesbury Road, Leverett last night

Plus AFD was pretty much flat out earlier in the day with ambulance runs and an unattended death.

The timing of the fire was both good and bad.  Since the house is pretty much a student rental and UMass is no longer in session the number of potential victims was lowered.

But for the same reason AFD no longer has the "Impact Shift" operational, which is funded by $80K from UMass to assure four extra firefighters are on duty (bringing shift total to 13) during the busy weekend evenings when ambulance runs for substance abuse are all too usual.

Although, even is this had been one of those weekends the Impact Shift does not report for duty until 9:00 PM and the fire broke out about 45 minutes earlier than that.

I asked Chief Nelson about all this Saturday morning quarterbacking on my part about staffing and a proposal he mentioned a while back at the initial DPW/Fire Station Advisory Committee about the town  hiring a consultant to do a (badly needed) staffing level study and he responded:

"Our minimum was eight last night. It goes to seven on June 1st. We go back to eight in the fall.

At the time of the fire last night, one ambulance was at the hospital with another one returning to town. That meant we had 4 personnel in town at the time of the fire; 3 at North Station, 1 at Central Station.

The returning ambulance was backing in as E-1 was pulling out of the bay and an off duty AFD FF ran across the street to join the response. That gave us 4 Firefighters arriving initially with 3 Firefighters coming from North Station.

If this had been September we would have been at nine minimum from 5pm to 9pm. At 9pm the impact personnel come on duty.

 When we first began the impact shifts I convinced John Musante that it was a good idea to go to nine from eight personnel in order to keep an odd number which allows us to staff 4 ambulances and keep 1 Captain in town for command & control.

Once we instituted the Paramedic Firetruck we changed that posture to staffing 3 ambulances and staffing the Paramedic Firetruck with 3 personnel. ALS care in addition to Fire/Rescue coverage that doesn't leave the town potentially without protection.

Luck played a part last night but the main reason we were successful was because of the people I'm fortunate to work with on this department.

The RFP submittal period closed on Thursday. Now the submittals will be reviewed and consultant chosen."

Indeed. 

I can't count the number of time I've heard informed sources say AFD is a victim of their own success:  A talented, dedicated group of professionals who do so much for so many with so few.

Conflagration

Forklift ablaze backlot of Leader Home Center

A forklift caught fire INSIDE a lumber yard at Leader Home Center on College Street but employees managed to get it safely outside the building, and AFD quickly snuffed it out.

Catastrophe avoided.  Barely.

Party Potential

Townehouse Apartments 2:30 PM

Townehouse Apartments 5:30 PM

In the span of just a few hours the crowd of college aged youth at the westernmost green space at Townhouse Apartments in North Amherst grew from a couple dozen to a couple thousand.  Fair enough, considering the beautiful spring weather and this being a l-o-n-g holiday weekend.

But when you mix that large a crowd in an enclosed area with copious amounts of alcohol, there's bound to be trouble.

Townehouse Apartments 6:30 PM: plenty of debris available

Around 6:30 PM a 911 call came in reporting a debris fire in the middle of the large crowd.  AFD responded and staged until APD, who had already put a mutual aid call to Hadley and Northampton, could secure the area.

 Townehouse Apartments 7:00 PM: clean up in aisle 5

And secure it they did, even though outnumbered hundreds to one.

 Sunday afternoon, the following day

At the 2013 Blarney Blowout, the year before the one that made national news but still compelling enough to be my "Story of the Year",  AFD had to respond to the middle of the crowd for an ETOH (alcohol poisoning) college aged female.

They were greeted with a hail of ice, cans and bottles (some of them full), thus APD was forced to wade in to break things up, resulting in six arrests.

The following year was even worse with 58 arrests resulting in enough national publicity to give the town and UMass a black eye and a renewed sense of purpose about killing the Blarney Blowout.

And in 2015 and 2016 with the assistance of 225 police officers, stern messaging from the University combined with a parking and overnight guest crackdown and a Mullins Center concert, the Blarney Blowout is no more.

But anytime there's nice weather late in the spring semester the potential for an (unnamed) blowout is pretty high.

Expensive Puzzle Pieces

Over half DPW equipment is routinely stored outdoors

DPW Chief Guilford Mooring and Weston & Sampson consultants present to Amherst Select Board

The Amherst Select Board was given an informational heads up presentation last night concerning the new DPW facility, which clocks in at 8.5 acres but combines many functions now spread out all over town and with a somewhat startling sticker price of $37 million, but that will go down somewhat after one site is chosen.

   Amherst DPW Equipment List

Current DPW building has no fire suppression sprinkler system

 Giant Arbor Vitaes would be removed for new for Fire Station entrance

Currently the plan is for the new $65+ million Wildwood Mega School to allow Fort River to be abandoned so it can become the new DPW.  The beloved old current DPW "Barn" would be demolished (after a Historical Commission demo delay hearing of course) for a new South Fire Station.

 AFD Central Station is too old and cramped for a modern day Fire Department

And the old downtown Central Station could be used for either the Jones Library expansion or sold to a private developer to become a taxpaying mixed use signature building in the heart of our commercial district.

Fort River Elementary School:  Colorful new location for DPW?

No Spring Break For AFD

Only call last weekend to higher education institutes was for gas leak at Valentine Hall

Yes with Spring Break sending the vast majority of college aged youth off to warmer climate zones the number of runs for Amherst Fire Department to our institutes of higher education fell to almost zero.

AFD Spring Break Runs

But, as is usually the case, one of the other five towns they serve stepped up to fill the gap. In this case Hadley, where emergency calls were over four times what they were last week (note two of them for "overdose").

Sad Commentary On Our Times

 New ambulance costs $260K and must negotiate all kinds of terrain

Presenting to the Joint Capital Planning Committee his $442,250 total capital budget request this morning Amherst Fire Department Chief Tim Nelson assumed a somber tone we he got to the next-to-the-last item on the list: "Never in my life would I ever expect to ask for this ... but we live in a different world now."

 Assistant Chiefs McKay and Stromgren (left & right) Chief Nelson (center)

The $17,500 item(s) he was requesting?

Ten bullet proof vests and helmets, one each for two ambulance personnel in all five AFD ambulances.  And yes this request was in the pipeline long before the recent weapon incident that sent UMass into lockdown.

But that incident certainly reinforced the sobering notion expressed by Chief Nelson that "It's going to happen here."

Assistant Chief McKay told the Committee that AFD has been training active shooter scenarios with UMass PD since 2002 (after Columbine) and since 2006 with APD.

These days protocols have changed somewhat in that rather than keeping FD in a "cold zone" where they are safe and protected until police have secured the area, the current idea is for PD to make a "dynamic entry" and clear part of a building so FD can then move in and stage in that "warm zone".

Because obviously the quicker medical experts can get to a victim the more likely they can do something to save a life.  But yes, at risk to their own lives.

The bullet proof vests would stay in the ambulance so they will get way less use than the ones worn by police officers daily, thus this request for 10 vests should be good for twenty years or more.

   AFD Capital Equipment Requests

Our other equally vital public safety department, APD, had only two requests, both somewhat big ticket items totaling $315,000.  The usual request for four new vehicles -- Ford utility Interceptors at $35,000 each -- and new portable radios for the entire department.

 Chief Livingstone (left) Captain Pronovost (right)

The front line patrol vehicles are run 24/7 with plenty of stop and go under all sorts of negative circumstances.  Next year (FY18) they will replace three cruisers but the price is going up about $5,000 per vehicle.   While the radios are all over 20 years old so parts are hard to come by. 

The last thing you want is for an officer responding to a life-and-death emergency being slowed by a vehicle break down.  And officer safety is compromised if their hand held radio should fail when they are in the field.

Our public safety departments -- Police, Fire and Dispatch -- cost $10 million in total operation budgets this year so these two department requests of $757,250 works out to under 8% of total budget.

Currently the Joint Capital Planning Committee uses 8% of the town's total budget for capital equipment/building/facilities spending, or $3.15 million.  Requests from all departments total $3.34 million, so cuts will have to be made.

Hopefully not from Police or Fire.

Masslive catches up to this story (Can the Gazette be far behind?)

Fire & Ice

AFD on scene 409 Main Street for burst sprinkler pipes

The recent arctic weather brought even more work to an already overburdened Amherst Fire Department with calls for help dealing with burst water pipes numbering around 40-- many of them in large commercial or academic buildings where the sprinkler systems were the culprit.

 AFD on scene UMass Goodell Library for burst sprinkler pipe

Yes, commercial sprinklers are located in the ceilings of buildings and heat does rise.  But a sprinkler system is designed to cover everything so all it takes is one small area where insulation is sub par.

Kind of like a frozen pond that has a tributary stream entering it so the ice is a lot thinner at that one spot and far more dangerous for an unsuspecting skater.

 AFD on scene Applewood Retirement Community for burst sprinkler pipe

Atkins Market, Applewood Retirement Community, UMass Goddell Library, Amherst College Merrill Science Center and a bevy of smaller commercial buildings all suffered the major hassle of freezing water raining down from above.

   AFD Valentine Weekend

In addition AFD had two almost simultaneous box alarms during the lunch hour on Tuesday that tied up the entire on duty shift, one at UMass North Village family housing and a chimney fire in a residence on Flat Hills Road.

 AFD on scene for box alarm UMass North Village Apartments

AFD on scene Flat Hills Road for a chimney fire

An emergency medical call for an elderly woman needing transport to Cooley Dickinson Hospital had to be handled by an ambulance from Northampton Fire Department because the two box alarms tied up all available AFD personnel. 

 Pine tree fell on car South East Street 4:45 PM Tuesday

NFD mutual aid would be required two more times before Tuesday was done.

 Severe 1 car crash into utility pole sent 4 occupants to Baystate Hospital closing Rt 9 overnight. Photo via Hadley PD Facebook

A severe one car crash into an Eversource utility pole on Rt9 in Hadley last night required three AFD ambulances and one from NFD.  All four victims were transported to Baystate in Springfield rather than nearby Cooley Dickinson Hospital because of the severity of their injuries.

So no, it's not just weekend drunk college students that overwhelm the Amherst emergency response system.

 UMass and Amherst College heating plants were working overtime

Skating On Thin Ice

Cleared skating rink may not be safe for a few more days

One (college aged) young man is lucky to be alive after he plunged through thin ice on Puffer's Pond yesterday after playing hockey with friends.

 Hockey gloves left behind on Puffer's Pond

AFD responded in force but no extrication was required as he managed to get out of the freezing water and make it to shore under his own power.

Although his hockey gloves were left behind, and firefighters deemed the ice unsafe for anyone to retrieve them.

AFD does of course train for ice water rescue.  Last year they had to cancel a drill because the ice on Puffer's Pond was too thick.  

Practice Makes Perfect

AFD Engines 3 & 4, Rescue 1 on scene Amherst College Dakin House for training

Besides paying the town $120,000 for ambulance and fire protection services this past year, Amherst College also allows AFD to train at the abandoned Dakin House next to the College owned Amherst Golf Course.

Since the Student Call Force has a few new members and the UMass campus is pretty busy today with students moving in, AFD decided to use the Dakin House for hands on training: Pulling hose lines and practicing rescues (using full turn out gear/air tanks) inside the once ornate house.

 Structure to left was off limits to training because it's in such bad shape

No, unfortunately they did not actually torch the two story house.

Although someday soon Amherst College will have to raze all the structures as they are increasingly becoming a safety hazard, even though our assessor still values the property at $677,200.

In 2015 AFD had its busiest year ever with Amherst College accounting for  4% of their total calls.

AFD: Busiest Year Ever!

AFD North Station strategically located next to UMass

Having listened to and covered up close a countless number of emergency calls over the past 12 months, I'm not surprised that 2015 was the busiest year ever for the Amherst Fire Department with a total of 6,363 calls, up 7.59% from last year's 5,914.

And that was accomplished without a 7.59% increase in staffing, the #1 problem now facing AFD.  The cramped condition and sorry state of Central Station is closely followed problem #2.

 Click to enlarge/read

 This year AFD and Dispatch cost Amherst taxpayers around $5,000,000 
 

UMass paid us $455,000 for emergency services this year and created 19.1% of the call volume, or $955,000 worth.

Amherst College paid the town $120,000 and created 4% of the call volume, or $200,0000.

Hampshire College paid us ZERO but created 3.1% of the call volume, or $155,000 -- enough to hire three new firefighters.

 AFD on scene Hampshire College 8/30/15 for typical "cooking smoke" false fire alarm

The Power Of Persuasion

AFD Ambulance 1 enroute to Cooley Dickinson Hospital

The cancellation of SantaCon was instrumental in keeping the last weekend in a college town before the students head home, a quiet one.

UMass had the lowest number of ETOH drunk runs all semester although  "Crossett Christmas" runs at Amherst College were once again the highest of the semester.

   AFD SantaCon Weekend

Our Other Problem

Those who chase the dragon get burned

Last week the Amherst Select Board, acting as liquor commissioners, spent two hours in heated public discussion weighing the problems caused by alcohol in our little college town.

They were trying to decide if a well run small business on the outskirts of downtown should have one of many beer/wine permits still available.

 Amherst Center Store located across street from Kendrick Place near UMass

Neighbors were nothing if not united in opposition citing student rowdiness, and the closeness of Amherst Center Store to both the UMass campus and of course the new controversial Kendrick Place apartments which they claim is overly populated by students.

The Select Board narrowly approved the liquor license by a 3-2 vote.

Heroin is of course an illegal drug, and unlike marijuana it will always stay that way.  For good reason.  It is killing our citizens -- especially our youth -- at an unprecedented rate.  More than 1,000 heroin/opioid deaths last year in the progressive state of Massachusetts.

AFD Runs Mid November

I hope the three heroin overdoses over a very short period of time AFD and APD had to deal with Sunday night serve as a wake up call.

Before it's too late.   

New Chief In Town

AFD Chief Tim Nelson (left) Firefighter Stephen Gaughan attending a Select Board meeting 2011

Amherst firefighter/paramedic Stephen Gaughan, who joined AFD in 2005, has been named the new Chief of Hatfield Fire Department where he started his First Responder career as a call firefighter in 1995.

Drunk Is Stupid

Still way too many drunk runs sucking up the valuable time of AFD on weekends.

Seven of the eight UMass ETOH responses required transport to Cooley Dickinson Hospital as did one of the two Amherst College ETOH calls, which ties up an ambulance for least an hour. 

In all 60% of "emergency runs' to UMass and 50% to Amherst College were alcohol related

And when they come in clusters all five Amherst ambulances can end up spoken for (in slurred words), meaning no other town ambulances are then available for a unanticipated emergency like a heart attack, auto crash or major structure fire.

   AFD Nov 1st Wknd runs

District Court Déjà Vu

Eastern Hampshire District Court Monday 9:00 AM

I have not seen a Monday morning in Eastern Hampshire District Court this crowded since the one that followed the Blarney Blowout in 2014 when 58 college aged youth were arrested -- beleaguered APD accounting for 55 arrests and UMPD only 3.

Yesterday it was "only" 32 total arrests being arraigned, 28 for APD and 4 of them UMPD.  And like the ignominious Blarney Blowout, all of them were pretty much alcohol related.

 Eric Beal (seated) watching the proceedings

UMass Neighborhood Liaison Eric Beal, himself a civil attorney, attended Monday's crowded arraignment session for the first time and came away very impressed.  He told me the courtroom was run like "a tight ship", the "most efficient courtroom" he had ever seen.

Between the 9:00 AM start and 11:00 AM adjournment Judge Payne and the DA's office had disposed of all 32 arrests.

It helps of course that the Commonwealth has a "diversion" program that turns criminal complaints into civil ones with the payment of the town bylaw fine ($300), four months probation and a required alcohol education program sponsored by UMass, or the "brains at risk" program for non UMass students.

And the District Attorney's office is always cool, calm and professional when pitching these pleas that work well for everyone.

I counted at least 20 APD arrests who took the diversion program, most of them arrested for underage drinking and "open container on a public way."  Thus the town "benefits" by $6,000 in fines.

APD Chief Livingstone tells me that overtime costs for the all-hands-on-deck Halloween weekend came to $5,885 thus we, sort of, broke even.

That fine money however goes into the General Fund and not to the police budget, so in that sense a losing deal for APD.

Most of the Blarney Blowout cases settled this same way although my memory is Judge Payne required perps to write a letter of apology to the Amherst police department for their boorish behavior that day.

Amherst Fire Department had their extra "impact shift" of four firefighters on duty from 9:00 PM to 7:00 AM all weekend (bringing total to 13) but that is covered by UMass who pays the town $80,000 "extra" per year to staff more ambulances on weekends when school is in session.

Darn good thing, since AFD had 30 medical runs to UMass, 20 of them for alcohol abuse and 16 of those necessitating transport to Cooley Dickinson Hospital, a round trip that eats up a full hour of time per ambulance.

ETOH = alcohol OD

A Viable 2nd Emergency Exit

Rolling Green Apartments, East Amherst

Disability Access Advisory Committee Chair Gerry Weiss summed up the public safety situation with two simple questions, one to his committee, "How safe would you feel if your main safety feature in a fire was an intercom?"; and then the 2nd directed to Dominic Marinelli, an accessibility consultant, "How far from a burning building would you like to be?"

Mr Marinelli consults for Beacon Industries who purchased Rolling Green Apartments last year for $30 million and was engaging in a conference call this morning with the committee.  

Amherst contributed $1.25 million in Community Preservation Act money towards that purchase in order to keep all 204 units on the Subsidized Housing Inventory, even though only 41 of the units are actually (slightly) below market rate.

At the time Amherst had an SHI of 10.8% so the loss of Rolling Green would have put us well under the 10% threshold, and then subject to a Ch40B development.

But now Beacon Industries wishes to do major renovations at the property costing 30% of assessed value, thus Americans with Disability Act standards kick in.  They were already turned down for a variance by the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board and are currently trying to get the blessing of the Disability Access Committee for a second attempt.

Since Rolling Green does not have any 3 or 4 bedroom units on single floor flat ground (all of them are townhouses) the committee had no major concerns about keeping the accessible units to 1 and 2 bedroom.

The major, major concern was a viable second means of egress from those units, and that's where the sparks started to fly.

The 2nd means of egress was not fully handicapped accessible but would -- stated Mr. Marinelli enthusiastically -- bring the tenant to a "landing" just outside the building as an "area of refuge".  The tenant could then use the intercom to contact help.

 DAAC Chair Gerry Weiss (top center) Senior Planner Nate Malloy (bottom right)

But when asked by town planner Nate Molloy how big was that landing, the response drew disbelief:  30" by 48".  NEXT TO A BURNING BUILDING.

Marinelli instantly said, "I can try to get whatever size you want.  How big do you want it?"

That's when Mr. Weiss asked him "How far from a burning building would you like to be?".  And a few other members murmured, "In a wheelchair!"

The Disability Access Advisory Committee decided they would contact AFD Chief Tim Nelson for his recommendations and talk with Mr Marinelli again at their next meeting.

Rolling Green Apartments 1/23/13  (photo: Steven O'Toole)

That Rolling Green fire was fatal

Home Is Where The Alcohol Is

AFD North Station, overlooking UMass

If UMass needs alcohol to sell the football team then perhaps they should think twice about how viable the game is as a stand alone enterprise.

Homecoming weekend should be about more than just alcohol.

 Lot 22 was ground zero for tailgating

McGuirk Stadium 6:00 PM Saturday

AFD Homecoming runs

17 out of 27 "emergency" runs (63%) to UMass were for excessive alcohol intake, aka ETOH