UPDATE: “Santa Ana’s nearly 130-year-old fire department is history come April — but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going away. The Santa Ana City Council has unanimously voted to have the Orange County Fire Authority take over fire services in the city,” according to KPCC.
The Santa Ana City Council is set to vote to outsource the Santa Ana Fire Department to the Orange County Fire Authority, at Tuesday night’s Council meeting.
Agenda Item 60C states:
AGREEMENT WITH THE ORANGE COUNTY FIRE AUTHORITY (OFCA) – OUTSOURCING FIRE AND EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Authorize the City Manager and Clerk of the Council to execute the agreement, subject to non-substantive changes approved by the City Manager and City Attorney.
GMT – With the Orange County Fire Authority for the purposes of outsourcing fire and emergency medical services effective April 20, 2012 for an eight-year term with renewal options – City Manager’s Office
This my dear readers is a done deal. The Voice of OC intimated in an article last week that the deal was being endangered by old firefighters who were OK with laying off younger firefighters as long as they could keep their 128 year old fire department. That was never going to happen. The City will save over ten million dollars by outsourcing to the OCFA, and they won’t have to lay off any firefighters.
The old guys will just have to finish out their careers and then retire bitterly with nothing but six figure pensions to mollify their hurt feelings. Poor babies…