Brighter Future Painted for NFPCA

Brighter Future Painted for NFPCA

FEATURES

The National Fire Prevention and Control Administration (NFPCA) has never had it so good as it will when it becomes part of the newly created Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA), according to George Jett, a member of President Carter’s government reorganization team.

Jett, who has become the Carter administration’s olive branch bearer to both the International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) and the International Association of Fire Service Instructors (ISFSI), spoke at the IAFC annual conference in Cincinnati on September 13 and the fall conference of the ISFSI in Sioux Falls, S.D., on September 29.

Although in talking to the IAFC he avoided mentioning any successor to Howard D. Tipton, who resigned as NFPCA administrator, two weeks later Jett told the ISFSI that the name of Gordon Vickery, former chief of the Seattle Fire Department, “is being well received at the White House.” Later in an interview, Jett said that “as far as I know,” Vickery was the only person being considered to head the NFPCA.

At the ISFSI conference, Jett commented, “I think the prospect is very good that Vickery will be on board by November 20th” as a consultant or in some other capacity to fill a leadership void that otherwise would exist because of the congressional recess in October and the normally extensive time for a presidential nomination to go through the Senate confirmation process.

Leadership vacuum

The prospect of a void in the NFPCA leadership occurs because Assistant Administrator David Lucht, who by law became acting administrator when Tipton left the NFPCA October 30 to become city manager of Daytona Beach, Fla., is also leaving to become vice president of engineering for Firepro, Inc., of Wellesley, Mass., a fire protection engineering firm, on November 20. Lucht also will head the new Center for Firesafety Studies at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass., on a part-time basis. The Center for Firesafety Studies is designed to allow students working for a degree in one of the conventional engineering fields to add fire protection as a specialty.

In addressing both the IAFC and the ISFSI, Jett was emphatic in stating that the National Fire Academy will be a definite entity in the FEMA collection of federal agencies that include the Defense Civil Preparedness Agency, Federal Disaster Assistance Adminstration, Federal Preparedness Agency and Federal Insurance Administration.

However, the selection of a new site for the fire academy is up in the air at this time. At the metropolitan chiefs workshop during the IAFC conference, David M. McCormack, academy superintendent, indicated that St. Joseph College in Emmitsburg, Md., was the site choice and one that could be occupied within months. Later at the same conference, Jett proclaimed ignorance of any such choice and said that the site selection was an open question-

A few weeks later, McCormack said that the Fire Training Academy of the New York Fire Department was also being considered. Gov. Hugh Carey of New York has offered at no cost to the national academy the use of a former hospital residence for nurses that is close by the New York City training site on Wards Island. The land and use of the training ground would be on a lease basis. One of the reasons for considering the move to New York City is the fact that the proposal is supported by New York State’s congressional delegation of 39 representatives and two senators.

Emmitsburg appears likely

At the time this is being written, however, the winds appear to be blowing favorably toward Emmitsburg and St. Joseph College, which offers 120 acres and room for expansion in contrast to the 8 1/2-acre plot at Margaret Webster Junior College. No other sites have been publicly mentioned by those familiar with the selection problem.

There is an appropriation of $6.5 million available for the acaderhy site and to this will be added the amount gained fron the sale of the Webster site, which is expected to bring about $2.5 million.

Jett told both the IAFC and the ISFSI that if the fire academy site is large enough to permit colocation of other FEMA operations, that would increase the credibility of the academy in the Congress. He expressed the opinion that FEMA will have a training and education mission that has to be developed.

Sees no CD threat

When ISFSI President Louis J. Amabili, director of the Delaware State Fire School, asked Jett why the fire program will not be subjugated to civil defense, Jett answered in three words, “The Joint Council,” referring to the battle waged in recent months by the Joint Council of National Fire Service Organizations to maintain the Nat ional Fire Academy and the current level in government of the fire program in the switch to FEMA.

Jett later added, “I don’t think there’s any threat that its day-to-day fire programs will be threatened by CD.”

In an interview after his ISFSI appearance, Jett explained that the aim of the government reorganization plan is not to reduce financial resources hut to get more from them. He also said that he expects “good results in six months to a year” from FEMA.

Strong local base sought

Jett explained that the government reorganization team wants an agency for the federal emergency services that has a strong base in the state and local areas and that the fire program provides this quality.

“We want an agency that has a demanding, viable constituency at the state and local level,” Jett declared.

In his remarks to the ISFSI, Jett stated that the NFPCA will be a proportionally far larger segment of FEMA than it now is in the Department of Commerce and he depicted the NFPCA role in FEMA as an important part in giving the new agency a strong emer gency and disaster mitigation thrust.

NFPCA strength

Jett admitted there was a risk in moving the fire program to FEMA but predicted that the new agency is going to be an agency that will give credible support to the fire program. He pointed out that the FEMA head will have direct access to the President and that the NFPCA will have a far greater portion of the FEMA budget than it has of the Department of Commerce budget.

He noted that of the approximately 800 persons who will be on the FEMA Washington staff, about 120 to 130 of those people will be in the NFPCA.

George Jett

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