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Posted by Nick on Sunday, January 11, 2009 at 13:57:05 :
Those of you that live in California have been hearing about the financial crisis this state is and has been in. Well now it affects everyone in this wonderful (tic) friggin state.
The Govenator has submitted, and it sounds like it will pass, a "solution" to the deficit of over 20 billion. Effective February 1, all State employees will be furloghed two days a month for two years. Now there are exceptions to that, for instance DMV possibly, State Parks, and some others.
This brings up quite an interesting situation. I work for CAL FIRE, the third largest fire dept in the nation. WE ARE NOT EXEMPT FROM THIS!!! We will be required to take two days off a month without pay. This will equate to about 35 to 40 fire engines statewide that will be uncovered during fire season, not to mention a 10% pay cut to all the fire fighters.
Now I know times are tough, and being a union memeber, we need to do our part. After all if we expect the state to give to us when we want or need, we hafta give to them when they need. But we took a 10% paycut for the winter months already. And is cutting the tail off a lizard really gonna help the lizard?? Where are the pay cuts for the large salaries in Sacramento that dont do their jobs?? Meaning the congress and senate. Did they take a 10% pay cut in winter months since they take so much time off anyway? I know its an extreme, but those clowns havent come up with a budget on time in over 10 years. And now they are saying they are gonna run outta money just over six months into a fiscal year. What if I did that for my job???
"911 whats your emergency?"
"theres a large fire in the grass behind my house and the wind is blowing it right to my house!!!!!!!"
"ok sir listen carefully, we cannot respond to that as its a weekend and we are dwonstaffed today, we're gonn hafta trust you can take care of that yourself. We will be there first thing Monday morning, if you still need us."
Now the same with the Sacramento clowns. They take holiday leave, leave their offices at 2 or 3 in the afternoon, work short weeks. All this while there is a budget crisis that affects millions in different ways, but do they care. Heck no, they are still getting their salaries and living high on the hog for not doing their jobs. Other than pay cuts for state personnel, I've seen nothing about cutting government size period. Sure some would loose jobs period, but if government is smaller and more efficient, wouldnt it be better??
In CAL FIRE we are dedicated to our jobs, sometimes too much. This last fire season lasted from May 15 to December 1. In seven months I was gone, assigned to fires, away from my home and family, (and my PW), a toal of 175 days. Now sure it was good money to do that, but there was no waste or frivolities there, it was all work. The state and its citizens we protected all that time certainely got their moneies worth outta us.
But in hindsight, had any of us nknown this would happen to us after we sacrifice all that time with family, we would have insisted on enforcing the 21 day rule. That is when a crew spends 21 days assigned to an incident, we must receive 2 days r&r, with pay, then we can do another 21 and so on. But this summer, hardly anyone did the rule, as there was too much going on, and crews were not available to cover our shifts if we did 2 days r&r, so we worked thru it. So much for helping the state.
Ok, sorry for the long winded-ness. It just got my blood pressure up to see the email come from arnold about this happening in a few weeks.
SO.... now the Power Wagon content..... if i get a 10% pay cut it will delay, even more than before, continuing and completing my project. And I'm so close to getting big steps done. Sorry it took so long for that..
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