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Escambia County Fire Chief Resigns
September 21, 2012
Escambia County Fire Rescue Chief Daniel R. Spillman has submitted his letter of resignation.
According to the letter, Spillman’s resignation will be effective December 18. His last day in the office will be October 19, and he will use accumulated leave to reach December.
Spillman did not provide a reason for his resignation.
“I have appreciated the opportunity to serve. If I can be of service in the future please do not hesitate to call,” he wrote in the letter to Mike Weaver, Public Safety director.
Daniel R. Spillman was announced as the new county fire chief in January 2011. Spillman was selected after a review of 20 candidates that applied for and met the minimum qualifications for the $81,000 a year job.
Spillman was chief of the Seminole Tribe Fire Rescue in Hollywood, Florida, prior to coming to Escambia County. From 1983 to 2005, he worked as the Deputy Chief of the Tallahassee Fire Department where he retired. During his tenure, the City of Tallahassee combined forces with the county fire departments which were primarily volunteer. With a bachelors degree from Florida International University in Fire Science and Safety, Spillman has 36 years experience in the fire service and emergency medical service fields.
Comments
28 Responses to “Escambia County Fire Chief Resigns”
@ Not a fact Jason said: “2 fire deaths in warrington with both deaths happening just 1.5 miles to 2 miles away from the station. With no response from station 16. 4 certified fireman/ emts at the station at the ready could have made a decent attempt to save those victims.”
Primary search completed by career fire crew nothing found.
Secondary search completed by career fire crew nothing found.
Just something to consider when you start to criticize Volunteer firefighters in Escambia County.
I posted a link showing that his average accrual of leave, granting no days off and no missed days he would still be shy. Then I linked the government site proving my statement. I thought since it was a not a commercial site, it would be tolerated. Anyway, he seems to be getting about 2 weeks to much leave in my opinion. Maybe part of a severance package?
The guy that took over the chief building inspection job hired a few months back. He replaced the Weeden guy because of political affiliation Weeden had against Robinson. So they fire Weeden after 28 years in the dept hire this guy from Detroit did not even have license to build in Florida, Guess what the new guy has already turned in his resignation. What a County need house cleaning around here
If they raise taxes you should be able to make payments instead of paying all at once.
He is probably leaving because of the union bullying him.
Hit a nerve huh just me, then if you are a volunteer, you can pull the numbers, they are public record. Part of my $80 dollars a year that i pay goes towards the north end. Do you think i like that? With out the south end residents, the fire service would not be sustainable financialy in the north end. FACTS.
@ashamed Why do you think I’m speaking of Century? There are other departments north if ensley that do not have 24 hour coverage. I take it you are a “professional firefighter” somewhere huh? The really sad thing here is that I am a volunteer with a firehouse in this county yet you have not seen one comment from me stating any thing other than facts, and not one single thing criticizing anyone! You my good friend need to get your facts straight before you start bashing people and stating facts that you are hearing from another “buddy”.
To comment on the article, it is unfortunate to lose another leader for the county. That being said, it does seem a little odd that they are dropping like flies…does no one who can actually make a difference notice this? Obviously the citizens of escambia county notice…the firefighters, both vols and paid, notice. I don’t understand what is so difficult about trying to fix an obvious problem. But of course, this is government and polotics. Why fix the obvious when we can waste time arguing about instead. I don’t care what anyone says, when YOU call 911, you want SOMEONE to show up. something needs to change. open your eyes escambia county…if your kid is lying on the floor about to die, would you pay an exra 15 dollars once a year to save em??? DUH! seriously people, lets stop being retarded!
Just me, there is politics in that. Kevin white refuses the service and so does Reggie Burkett. Even though the tru fact is century cant get a truck out 86% of the calls.
@jason My point exactly! What I’m paying now which is the same as what a citizen in Ensley is paying however they can get 24 hour staffing and I can’t? That is bull.
Jason, if you took one good Manager and put him/her in charge of all county budget money, you’d be surprised just how much waste goes on. I spent all of my adult life working for county government and can tell you first hand how they spend excess money at the end of their fiscal year so they either don’t have to give it back and/or can show where they used it all so they can start asking for at least the same amount the following year. All of the departments do it and it’s accepted by the BOC. They do it themselves. Tax Watch doesn’t even come close to reporting all the waste. God help you if you ask ONE employee to do a task w/o assigning at least two more to go with them for company. You aren’t going to get anyone to stay in this position long. You can’t pay a third of your workforce and not pay the other two thirds for the same job. Could you imagine trying to manage the whole group. I stand by my opinion that these are first responders that when you need them, I don’t think you nor I would care about paying a few more dollars in taxes to get them there sooner. Now, do I think there is a lot of fat that could be trimmed now to help this cause?? By all means, hell yes. Getting some one to do it is a very extinct animal. Good luck on that one.
When your house is on fire or your family is at risk who comes? The fire Dept. They do a great job and deserve more new equipment and more respect. I don’t care if they are volunteers or paid…they save lives and deserve respect. Maybe we don’t have the resources we should have to pay them all, so maybe we should cut the County commissioner’s pay a bit to pay for more firefighters!
The county has spent countless money’s, countless abouts of times, countless amount of manpower to boost the volunteer numbers to no avail. They have offered free classes, free certs, and had lack luster turn out. They spent thousands of dollars on tv commercials, billboard ads, and radio spots. THEY HAVE TRIED. even increased the stipen. Hasnt worked yet
Let me spit some numbers at you.
2 fire deaths in warrington with both deaths happening just 1.5 miles to 2 miles away from the station. With no response from station 16. 4 certified fireman/ emts at the station at the ready could have made a decent attempt to save those victims.
300,000 plus residents in Escambia County. 27 around the clock fireman guarenteed to protect them. (not including day time crews since they get off at 4pm. the people who live in century molino cantonment myrtle grove have paid coverage but only from 7-4 M-F after those hours its a crap shoot and not guarenteed) thats roughly 1 fireman to 11,000 people. To compare the city has about 25- 28 on duty at a time protecting 35,000 plus people.
85 bucks a year gets you want you have now. Lack of responses by volunteer companies and therefore pulling from a career district leaving that district unprotected to run the missed calls.
100 bucks a year gets you more staffing and a guarenteed response from districts who cant guarentee the responses.
0 raises to fire personel if tax increases. They arent even asking for a raise. they are asking for more money for more people to protect the unprotected.
And dont say people will go homeless cause they cant pay 100 bucks a year thats less than 12 dollars a month. the cities residence pay way more than we do. and here are some more numbers
Year
2 Cartons of cigarettes: $120
2 Xbox games: $120
Cell phone: $100
Cox Bill: $100 plus
Month
1 pack of smokes: $9
Dinner for 2 at burger king: $15
case of beer: $8- $12
rethink what you think you know.
Everybody has an opinion, well here’s mine and it’s a fact. He did not just quit. There are other issues regular ding his resignation that you all don’t know about. And now here we go again volunteer this paid that. Some say let’s get all paid. That’s fine you think the homeless rate is high now go ahead raise everybody’s taxes to pay for the career guys. On the other hand all you haters try supporting both and get more volunteers involved and we can have a win win. Unless you all have got millions to share everybody can’t afford all paid crews.
In a perfect world, yeah this county needs career positions at every house in the county 24 hours a day. If the tax payer in the South end of the county gets 24 hour coverage for the same tax dollar the North end tax payer pays, then it is unfair to the North end citizen. The way this County is now financially, staffing all stations 24 hours will not happen for a good many years, and with the crime rate in Pensacola increasing rapidly, citizens are probably going to start considering moving away to get away from the thugs.
any one in that postion earns his money. you cant knock a guy for making money. He has a tough job to do. If you wana make that cash, go to school. work in any job for thirty plus years.
Dont even say paid guys to it for the paycheck, either. I promise I am not in it for the money and work 3 other jobs to make up. I do it cause I love pensacola, I love the people, and I love helping people.
Newsflash the volunteers were not aswering calls when perkins was in office, when sanders was in office, when edwards was in office and now when spillman was in office. Dont bash the guys that show up to work everyday and actually get on the rigs and do the job. Its an honorable profession. It needs to be treated as such. Also if you dont like your private sector job go work for goverment. I promise youre private sector job pays more. the city has a population of 30,000+ people with 23 to 25 fireman on duty at one time. The county has a population os 350,000+ people and has 25- 30 people on duty (guarenteed) on the weedays and less on weekends.
why do you always have to bring in the volunteers into the mix. This county needs all full time paid fire staff. Look at the reports about no volunteers responding to calls. What do you expect. This is 2012 and times, people, fires, population has changed. this is no longer a small town with small town departments. Get real people. He quit becuase he either couldn’t do the job or he wasn’t supported by our backwoods county commissioners.
This county needs to get off the wagon and hire all f/t firefighters. It would then have less bickering and you wouldn’t have the “they’re paid and we aren’t” problem. Lets face it, if your house was on fire and lord forbid one of your family members was trapped inside, would you want to wait for someone to come from the house or already be at the firehouse? You people complain when you don’t get the service you expect for your tax dollars, but then you’re the first to complain when you see a few of the firefighter eating lunch together in a restaurant. You can’t have it both ways. By the way, it would take a raise in taxes and some good money mangers to make this happen and we have neither at the moment. Just my opinion.
Maybe the vol will come back, he chased a lot of the away. need to get ride of the paid and it will save the tax payers a lot of money that they dont have. if they want to be paid?let them go to the citys jobs.
Another fire chief leaves ???????? And we wonder why all the volunteers are leaving.
Ya, considering no leave taken and even fudging for holidays, someone may need to re figure the numbers.
http://www.fairwork.gov.au/leave/leave-calculator/pages/default.aspx
Annual Leave
Under the National Employment Standards, the outstanding annual leave accumulated between 01 January 2011 and 21 September 2012 is 262 hour(s) and 46 minute(s).
This has been calculated based on the following information you provided:
Full-time employee not working as a shift worker
Working 38:00 ordinary hours per week on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays
(Full-time employees work an average of 38 hours a week and usually have an ongoing period of employment. Under the National Employment Standards, leave only accumulates for the first 38 hours worked – leave is not calculated on any hours employees work above this. )
No unpaid leave taken
No annual leave taken
And another one bites the dust, go figure.
You never know until you check around, and wonder why the county is always after more of the tax money. That is around $6,750.00 per month. How much leave does the county commissioner get per year?
No wonder this guy quit. This is like the 3rd one in 3 years. sounds to me like they need to clean house of every high ranking fire postion (both career and vol) It can’t be the “other” guys fault all ……3…… times.
From January 2011 to September 2012, he built up TWO MONTHS worth of accumulated leave? It must be nice working for governmental agencies…you can’t get that kind of leave in the private sector…WOW!