CFSVA

[jaff]

By way of an explanation: A massive flood deluges a rural area, in this area lives a god fearing man whos property will no doubt be inundated by the flood waters, as all his neighbours are evacuating they ask him to accompany them to safety. The god fearing man tells to leave without him as god will save him!.

Later as the flood waters start to swirl around his house the local emergency brigade drive up in a large 4wd to evacuate him to safety, again he dismisses their help stating "God will save me".

That evening as he is standing on the 2nd storey balcony of his house with the ground floor of his house completely under water, a rescue boat from the local emergency brigade arrive to rescue him, once again he ignores their pleas saying "God will save me".


The next morning a helicopter spots the lonely figure of the man sitting on the roof of his house with floodwaters raging around him, from their low hover they try to get him to fly with them to safety, once again he refuses saying "God will save me".

Finally as the waters are eddying around his chin a submarine unbelievably surfaces alongside him, trying to pull him to safety he once again dismisses their pleas, saying "God will save me".

That afternoon the man drowns, eventually he finds himself in heaven standing before God, the man is very angry, he confronts God telling him of the spartan life he lived on Earth and his unwavering devotion to God and his devastation that God didnt save him!.

God looks at the angry farmer with a perplexed look upon his face and says "what did you want , I sent a 4wd drive, I sent you a boat, I then sent you a helicopter.....Fux sake I even sent you a submarine....what more did you want!"


CFSVA is only as effective as the people they represent let them be!
If we as a total service cannot get behind them, they will only ever be mildly effective, in fact their position at present is almost untenable!

[misterteddy]

sorry Jaff....on this I completely disagree with you. They are a paid service, with a salaried CEO. I expect the same results from them as from any other business. They should be presenting solutions to us, collected from their research in the field.....not the other way around.

As for untenable.....if we keep in mind who funds them....it always has been

[Pipster]

No, The CFSVA is not a paid service.

It is not that long ago that the executive officer was a volunteer position.  The workload was large, and a decision was made to pay the executive officer.

The Executive Officers job is do undertake the things that the membership want, not tell them what to do!  Hence why it is important for people to have input into their local CFSVA

Pip

[misterteddy]

No, The CFSVA is not a paid service.

It is not that long ago that the executive officer was a volunteer position.  The workload was large, and a decision was made to pay the executive officer.

The Executive Officers job is do undertake the things that the membership want, not tell them what to do!  Hence why it is important for people to have input into their local CFSVA

Pip

so we pay the Executive Officer....that makes it a paid service unless I missed something.

Now Pip, don't go mis-quoting me, I never said they should be telling us what to do. I did say, that they should be getting their research from the field (that means them the paid types doing the leg work,not us) and then presenting us with solutions, again, based on their research. There are numerous examples around of single person Executives reporting to Boards, no different to that. And by the way.....did we get to vote on the appointment, and was it for a fixed term?

[rescue5271]

Paid staff are not representate by the CFSVA some not sure how many paid staff are already in UNIONS.. The CFSVA is for the Volunteers and they are only as good as what we the Volunteers tell them to do or chase up...

[Darius]

I did say, that they should be getting their research from the field (that means them the paid types doing the leg work,not us) and then presenting us with solutions, again, based on their research. There are numerous examples around of single person Executives reporting to Boards, no different to that. 

sounds just like what Wendy does (from what I've seen anyway). But this 'getting their research from the field' part you mention above means they need input from all of us, or those of us that want their opinions taken into account anyway.

[boredmatrix]

I'm a little bit confused by the attitude being spread on here about the CFSVA

What part of UNION don't people understand?

the whole concept of a union is about COLLECTIVE POWER.

In this day and age - it would be unreasonable to expect one person to be the mouthpiece and co-ordinator of an association as large as the CFSVA (given that it represents literally thousands of volunteer firefighters in this state)and still work a fulltime job - hence the reason this is a paid position.

This person can still only maintain the status quo as long as they are being assisted by the members.

This begs the question of why so many seem to attack the Association in forums such as this.

Would it be too hard to pick up the phone and ask "what can I do to help?"

[rescue5271]

May be those who are attacking the VA should come along to one of their meeting's and have your say there...YES anyone can attend a VA meeting not just the brigade or group REP.....