Tim Travers of the NFPA addresses the SWAB.

Don Konkle;left; Dave Wyrwas;right; present President award to Art Martynuska

Don Konkle;right; Dave Wyrwas;center present speakers award to PEMA Director Glen Cannon

Chairman Barrar indicated his desire to push the bill through the House in the next few weeks and encourage the Senate to pass it by February.  This is a very aggressive time schedule and we will need all of you to voice your support and demonstrate the need for the grant funding to your local legislators in the next few months.

View HB 955

On behalf of Pennsylvania’s fire service, the Coalition is extremely pleased to announce that on August 29, 2011, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett will sign Act 46 of 2011 – the Firefighter Cancer Presumption Law – which designates cancer as an occupational disease for firefighters and extends the limitations period for filing firefighter cancer claims to more than 11 years.

Act 46 of 2011, which became effective on July 7, 2011, is the result of a 25-year effort by career and volunteer firefighters to win much-needed protection for our brothers and sisters and their families. The Firefighter Cancer Presumption Law will enable firefighters to receive workers’ compensation benefits if they develop cancer and can establish exposure to certain carcinogens at fire or hazmat incidents during their careers.

Here are some important facts about the new law:

• The Cancer Presumption Law applies to any cancer. Firefighters who have served four or more years will be entitled to a presumption that their cancer is job-related, similar to the process used when firefighters suffer from lung cancer, heart disease, or more recently, Hepatitis C.
   
• Firefighter cancer claims may be brought on behalf of any active or retired, career or volunteer firefighter who is being treated or has been treated for cancer, regardless of when their cancer was diagnosed or treated.
   
• The Cancer Presumption Law extends the period for filing claims to 600 weeks after separation from service. Firefighters who separated as long ago as January 2000 may be entitled to benefits.
   
• Firefighter cancer claims may also be brought on behalf of surviving family members of firefighters who died as a result of cancer. To qualify for benefits, surviving spouses or dependent children must file a claim within three years of the firefighter’s death.
   
• Volunteer firefighters must participate in PennFIRS reporting to make a cancer claim, and must have passed a physical exam before their service that did not reveal the presence of cancer.

Benefits available under Act 46 are significant and may include retroactive and prospective salary and benefits, medical care for cancer treatment, and reimbursement for medical costs. The Firefighter Cancer Coalition recommends that any active or retired career or volunteer firefighter who has battled cancer act quickly to investigate your rights under the new cancer presumption law. Additionally, if you know a family member of a firefighter who has succumbed to cancer within the last three years, please advise them to do the same.

For information on filing a claim, contact the Firefighter Cancer Coalition’s legal counsel at 1-866-413-COMP today. Your claim will be evaluated by experienced and competent counsel, who will work with you to develop a plan to protect your rights.

Scheduled for November 18, 19 and 20 and taught buy a group of experienced leaders, this course will also help your organization achieve goals and excel.

View the brochure and registration form.

 “Chet was a hands-on chief who let you know he was in charge,” said Hedrick, a retired Harrisburg Bureau of Fire captain.

“He was like George Patton on a fire scene running across rooftops. Chet was an old-time fire chief with modern ideas. He used to tell us that only the strong survive.” 

Henry, Harrisburg fire chief for four years and Pennsylvania Fire Commissioner for 12 years was laid to rest today. The current State Fire Commissioner Edward A. Mann called Henry “a dedicated public servant who spent much of his life serving others, in both the military and the fire service.

The firefighting community in Pennsylvania is stronger today thanks to his contributions.” 

Thanks Chief Henry, Rest Easy Brother

Volunteers Workmen's Comp

The Strap is a visual recognition of something that has always been part of the essence and soul of firefighters; the willingness to put it on the line ‘so others might live’.  It is something that reached an unparalleled magnitude in the ashes of 9-11.

Conceived as a way to keep alive and relevant the memory of the firefighters we lost and continue to lose to 9-11, the 9-11 Commemorative Chin Strap™ is a meaningful, tangible, inclusive and affordable way for departments to honor them.

The Pennsylvania Fire & EMS Institute has chosen to be part of the Program and has been designated beneficiary of 9-11 Chin Straps sold in PA. 

$5.00 of each Strap purchased by individuals and departments in Pennsylvania is being donated to the Institute.  In addition, $1.00 of each strap purchased is being donated to the National Fallen Firefighter Foundation.

Please consider joining us and departments across the country in the effort to insure the memory of those lost to 9-11 stays alive and relevant.

To find more, visit LightHouseUniform.

Lawmakers in the state House of Representatives voted Wednesday night to eliminate a statewide mandate that would require sprinkler systems to be installed in newly built homes.

The House passed the bill on a vote of 129-68 to send the bill to Gov. Tom Corbett to sign into law. The state Senate voted 33-17 to repeal the mandate Tuesday.

The bill repealed a law in the Uniform Construction Code that went into effect on Jan. 1 which said all new one- and two-family homes were required to install sprinkler systems.

Rep. Mike Peifer, R-Greene, an outspoken opponent of the mandate, said it was “too far reaching.”

“I’ve heard from all over my district ... that the measure was just too far reaching,” he said Thursday.

Although the residential sprinkler mandate is removed, the law would require builders to offer sprinkler systems to buyers at the point of sale, which the Pennsylvania Builders Association (PBA) says is a “proactive” step to improve safety standards.

“This is a true victory for consumer choice,” PBA President Ray Venema stated in a press release. “Clearly, PA’s lawmakers have listened to their constituents and done the right thing by voting to put this decision back into the hands of the consumers where it belongs.”

A Senate amendment removes the General Assembly from the code-changing process by increasing the threshold for approving changes in the construction code from a simple majority to a two-thirds majority of the 19-member panel that oversees triennial revisions of the code.

Peifer said it should be this way because the panel is compromised of industry professionals who are the most knowledgeable of the code.

“They are the professionals who are building the homes,” he said. “They have the knowledge to make the decisions on their own.”

Democratic opponents said the amendment would effectively give the builders veto power over future changes to the state’s Uniform Construction Code.

Environmental groups and lawmakers said the building industry representatives on the panel hold enough votes to block a two-thirds majority and warned that they might stop adoption of stricter energy conservation requirements and other important standards.

Sprinklers would still be required in new town house construction.

The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) launched a media campaign against the repeal, saying that sprinkler systems would not only assist fire departments but also save the lives of residents.

Former Honesdale Fire Company Deputy Chief Lt. Kipp Welsh said if there was going to be a mandate, it should be for a more practical item — smoke detectors.

“Smoke detectors are a cheap way to save your life,” he said.

A January 2008 report conducted by the NFPA found that the chance of surviving a reported home fire when working smoke alarms are present is 99.45 percent.

Log Homes

 The bill also contained language re-inserting trade-offs on energy efficiency for log home builders — a huge benefit for the unique industry.

Jack Mundy, director of sales at the Honesdale-based Estemerwalt Log Homes, said the passage of the repeal was “a huge win.”

“The good news is we got the trade-offs,” he said. “It’s still a sound way to build homes and it’s energy efficient.”

The 2009 International Residential Code (IRC) removed trade-offs regarding energy efficiency and put more restrictions on the log home construction business by changing requirements in wall thickness, window quality and heating systems.

PBA spokeswoman Melissa Etshied said the log home provisions included in the repeal were “integral” to the industry across the state.

“The energy efficiency provisions didn’t allow log home manufacturers to take advantage of trade-offs as they had in the past,” Etshied said. “They couldn’t meet energy efficiency standards” under the more strict IRC regulations.

“The changes are integral to that industry and that’s huge in Pennsylvania,” she added.

A call to a spokesman for Corbett was unsuccessful.

Recently, the super-sensitive smoke alarm near our kitchen started squalling in response to a charred bit of something overcooking in a saucepan. I cringed because my 6-year-old was asleep. A champion snoozer, she never flinched. And now, new research scarily shows she's no exception.

Being a deep sleeper is really good in terms of her getting uninterrupted z's, but it would have been really bad had the smoke alarm heralded true danger. It's not the first time I've wondered whether smoke alarms even do any good when it comes to rousing children. Now an Australian study's got my answer, and it's a definitive no.

Researchers at Victoria University in Melbourne concluded that 78% of school-aged children slept through a smoke alarm blaring for 30 seconds. The study, published this month in the journal Fire and Materials, asked 79 families to trip their smoke alarm after their child had been asleep between one to three hours.

The group of 123 children — the average age was 9 — was split in two according to which children had hit puberty. It was an intentional division: plasma melatonin levels — melatonin, a naturally occurring hormone, helps induce sleep — decrease in conjunction with puberty onset. 

Parents reported that of the 22% of children who awoke, only half identified the noise as a smoke alarm. And only half of those children knew that smoke alarms mean Get Out Now. Younger kids between the ages of 5 and 10 made up 70% of the study participants; they were likeliest to sleep through the alarm. Just over half of 11-to-15-year-olds, or 56%, slept through the din, but 87% of the younger group did.

It's not that smoke detectors aren't helpful; they've been used in homes since the 1960s and have certainly saved lives. But it's a reminder that the people you may be most concerned about in the event of a fire are least likely to even know an emergency is underway.

"Parents should not rely on their children waking to the smoke alarm in the event of a fire and should not assume that they will immediately evacuate if they do wake up to a fire," says Dorothy Bruck, the study's lead author and a professor of psychology at Victoria University who researches clinical aspects of sleep/wake behavior.

Many fire departments are more than happy to make home visits — ours in Raleigh, N.C., did — to help homeowners formulate an evacuation plan. Still, Bruck's research is a reminder that a plan is no good if it depends on smoke alarms to wake kids up. Parents, consider it a wake-up call.

South central Pennsylvania suffered a major tragic event this past week, while our state lawmakers actively worked against prevention of similarly tragic events in the future.

Unfortunately, this past week, money spoke louder than safety.

It's sad, but the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania will have to suffer now that our House lawmakers voted 154-39 to repeal a law that requires sprinkler systems in all new residential construction homes.

Such legislation could prevent disasters like the one in Perry County from occurring.

The bill (S.B. 377) now moves on to the Senate where we as citizens can only hope that state senators will take note and not allow this sprinkler code to be repealed.

As with any issue in Harrisburg, the battle lines have been clearly drawn and all of them have pros and cons. On one side are the public safety officials, along with the many dedicated firefighters and emergency service personnel who know from personal experience that home sprinklers DO save lives and property. On the other side are the realtors and home builders who say that the additional cost of installing sprinklers in new homes is a detriment to sales, particularly in a weak housing market.

The vote by our state legislators was strongly in support of its repeal. The builders have a strong lobbying effort, and it showed by the tens of thousands of dollars that were spent fighting to have the code repealed via the many ads in newspapers and

contributions to our elected officials' campaign war chests.

This stance alone shows that economic concerns are much more persuasive than common sense and life safety.

The cost argument that has been put forward by the builders is a legitimate argument. But it's the overall cost that seems to change, depending on whether you're speaking with someone who favors sprinklers or someone who opposes them.

Many studies have been provided by both sides and an acceptable price range would be $1.65 per square foot. Factor this price into a 3,000-square-foot home, and your price comes to just under $5,000. When you look at the overall price of most new homes today in the Harrisburg region, I think you would have to say that $5,000 isn't a whole lot of extra money in a new home that is going to be your life dream and most likely the place you will live in for the remainder of your life.

When you look at this figure in light of a 30-year mortgage, it would equal approximately $14 of additional cost per month. Is fire protection on your life's dream and the safety of your family not worth $14? Yes, the $5,000 figure is for an average cost, and the bigger the home is, the more the system will cost. But this is true with most all aspects of a new home construction -- the bigger the home is, the more the electrical system, HVAC, plumbing and the structure itself will cost.

Some say that their home already has fire protection, since hard-wired smoke detectors are required. Unfortunately a smoke detector will not put out a fire. It will only alert you to a fire in your home.

By having sprinklers, you have the added protection of a fire suppression system on site. It's like having a fire department in your home 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

An argument that I find very interesting from sprinkler opponents is their claim that the law is burdensome on rural communities. But that's the area where I would think you would want sprinklers. Sprinklers can limit the fire damage and even extinguish a fire prior to a fire department arrives. The lack of water sources for fire departments and the lack of manpower for our dedicated volunteer systems in rural areas only supports the argument that sprinklers are the best fit for a rural setting.

When you look at the overall cost for a sprinkler system on an average size home and compare it to the cost of a tragic event that could involve the loss of a life, I think you will see that the sprinklers are well worth the price.

As an elected official in my local school board, I can say that safety for our students is always at the top of my priority list. How our state elected officials can say that they had safety as their top priority when voting to repeal the sprinkler code is beyond me.

When you look at all of the facts that are out there today, I think you will see that there is no debate on the effectiveness of sprinklers. Sprinklers do save lives and they have prevented events similar to those that we have been reading about in the newspapers over the past five months.

How many more lives need to be lost before our elected officials will see that sprinklers are the most effective way to save lives?

State Rep. Bill Keller, D-Phila., today rallied with firefighters from Philadelphia and around the state to counter attempts by some to repeal the implementation of a building code requirement that all new single and two-family homes include fire protection sprinklers.

Keller said lobbying groups like the Pennsylvania Home Builders have a financial interest in seeing the sprinkler provision for new homes repealed or delayed. He said they should be more concerned about safety.

"Sprinklers save lives, and that should be our focus," Keller said. "Those who want to repeal this requirement have something to gain financially from its demise. Firefighters, those who race to people's burning homes day in and day out and risk their own lives to do it, know these sprinkler systems save lives. We all should be on the side of saving lives." 

Keller said the cost of including sprinklers in a new home is about $1.60 per square yard, or what most homeowners might pay for carpeting and flooring. He said sprinklers not only provide safety for occupants, they greatly reduce the damage of injury or death to responding firefighters.

The sprinkler code provision went into effect in January and has been upheld by Commonwealth Court. Republican lawmakers are planning to reintroduce legislation to delay or repeal the code requirement for sprinklers.