Home burns then fire department charges residents nearly $20,000: Privatization

[1monster]

[reflection]

1. Well, the important thing

is that they didn't have to pay taxes for a socialist fire department.

[Ineeda]

2. Won't pay "hundreds"

to a private firefighting service 20 miles away (even though the available firefighters are also 20 miles away) and don't pay taxes to their community to support firefighting services. I'd bet they don't have adequate, if any, fire insurance also. The personal impact is devastating, of course, but still...who do they think pays for these firefighters and the services they provide? And would they feel differently if their home had been saved?

Wasn't there a similar story a couple of years ago?

[AtheistCrusader]

3. That one was slightly different.

The people in the house hadn't paid their fire insurance, so the fire department didn't intervene, beyond standing by to make sure the fire didn't spread to other homes that were covered.

[WinstonSmith4740]

7. It wasn't their insurance.

It was a county surcharge that the home owner had completely forgotten about because it was a new charge, not on the usual tax bill. He even offered to pay the fee at the time and was refused. No matter how you look at stuff like this, it sucks.

[PumpkinAle]

4. Residents already pay a fire district assistance tax......

“Residents living in the area pay a fire district assistance tax. The name alone implies it goes towards fire service in their area, but it doesn’t. It’s a county-wide tax to help fund volunteer fire districts.

The people in Purcell’s neighborhood have no fire coverage, but they say they didn’t know that until after Purcell’s house fire.

“Coincidentally, we all received a bill from Rural Metro fire informing us we have no fire coverage in our area, so they highly suggested we finally begin paying some fire coverage that we didn’t currently have,” said Miller.

Thinking they were already paying for fire coverage, residents were skeptical that Rural Metro, who just filed for bankruptcy, was trying to make a buck marketing their fire subscription.”

[Jack Rabbit]

5. There are some services the goverment provides better than private business

Like police and fire protection.

Good grief, a $20K bill from a private fire company? Will their insurance cover that, or do we need socialist fire insurance to prevent bankruptcies in case one's house burns down where a private fire company like this one must put it one.

This sounds like the racket Caesar's pal Crassus had in ancient Rome. Crassus made a mint bargaining with a property owner for use of his private fire fighters while the house burned. Then Crassus, a real estate tycoon, would buy the property at way below value, fix it up and sell it for a huge profit. I haven't heard that Crassus started any of the fires he put out, but it would make sense if he did.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

8. I once knew a guy would shoot out store front windows...

... of businesses they had contracts with when business got slow.

[freshwest]

12. That's the one I remember, thanks for the details.

And we did catch a real estate developer burning a house to save the cost of demolishing it properly years ago. In a red state. I was witness to that, and another incident.

A church made a deal with a landower who sold them his property. Part of it was to allow a long time tenant to keep living there as long as he wanted.

It wasn't in the way of the parking lot, buildings, etc. It was a beautiful piece of land with many old trees. The church bulldozed all of it, just because.

But one day while the family was at work and the kids at school, the house rather conveniently caught fire. It wasn't in bad shape, either.

I watched in shock as the volunteer fire department stood back and watched it burn, chatting with the pastor. It wasn't engulfed in flames, either.

They just stood there. The church magnamiously gave the family a month's rent and kicked them out of the now upscale area.

The story here, sounds like a damned scam to me.

[Heather MC]

6. I bet you any amount of money that it's mostly the wealthy part of the county that has the free Fire

department.

[groundloop]

9. Not gonna' touch that bet....

'cause you're probably correct.

[zeemike]

10. Yep. socialism for the rich

And capitalism for the poor...that is what makes us free.

[Heather MC]

11. Damn

that's how it is