Northmore says the city has run out of credit and must stop the bleeding
Northmore says the city's line of credit from EMS workers has run out and the situation was willed into existence by officials who ignored warnings. He says every other fix has been tried except fair pay, which is the wound bleeding EMS of personnel, morale, and experience.
The line of credit this city's and state's legislatures and executives have taken out for decades from the rare and exceptional people willing to descend into these situations for shameful compensation and disrespect has run out.
This situation has not been brought on by some force of nature or act of God.
It has been willed into existence by past city council members being informed of a clear and present danger to the citizens of this city and stating, moving on to new business.
It hasn't been manifested by a weather emergency or pandemic, but by past mayors stating the work is different to justify our racist and sexist second-class first responder status for decades.
True, the member of this council's mayor of the city and government of this state have not overseen the decades of belittling and undervaluing of the members who take care of people hit by trains,
seizing on sidewalks, lost all of their skin in fires, drowning in their own fluids from pregnancy complications, entangled, maimed in heavy machinery, or descending into the darkness of pandemic.
I do commend the members of this committee who have spoken out and are proposing these measures, but as any member of this city's emergency system,
Services will tell you the people of this city do not want to hear words of comfort with our arrival.
They demand action.
The commissioners have sounded the alarms.
The chief have sounded alarms.
The unions have sounded the alarms.
The EMS service has followed every avenue to prevent this, and they have failed.
Hospital liaison units, paramedic response units, tactical response groups, mutual aid ambulances, closest hospital transports, volunteer ambulances, one-for-one relief mandated over times,
all to ignore the bleeding, seizing, wheezing, inconvenient truth in the corner of the room.
I've seen every other measure to fix this system tried and failed except the primary one that almost every member agrees on.
Our pay that is as fair as the separate but equal policies of this nation's past.
It will not fix all the problems with this system.
But unless this pay issue is addressed, I have no confidence any other measure will exceed.
Succeed.
It is the wound that is bleeding us of personnel, morale, resources, wisdom, experience, and talent, from the ranks of EMT to paramedic to lieutenant to captain to chiefs to even our supervising doctors.
The past remedy has been only to pump in new blood as we bleed out.
You do not have to be a doctor, medic, or EMT to know when faced with what to address first, pumping in new blood or stopping the bleeding.
Stop the bleeding.
The EMTs, paramedics, and officers and doctors of FDNY EMS will continue to answer the rising tide of emergency calls in this city on
under solemn oath and dwindling resources, with the blood on our boots, placenta fluid on our pants, and cerebral spinal fluid on our sleeves.
We await for the appropriate response to this clear and present danger to the citizens and visitors of the city of New York from all the other oath-takers for the public safety and public good.
Thank you, and may God bless the members of EMS.
Thank you.