President Of FMBA And Citizens Protest Townships Decision On Privatizing EMS, At Reorganization Meeting

VIDEOS (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) of some of the angry citizens-including the President of the FMBA, Charlie Cunliffe and EMS Supervisor Scott Carter-speaking out against the Township’s decision to privatize the EMS Department.

VIDEO 2

VIDEO 3

VIDEO 4

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33 COMMENTS

  1. This is a bunch of “noise”.

    Bottom line is if it saves money for Lakewood and we still get the same service then why not! The committee should look into applying this for every piublic service possible in Lakewood.

    I am concerned about this GEM ambulance that supposidely is Langert brother in law company. That should be off the table I do not want to see any type of “chashash” of favoritism. “Vehisim nekiyim”!

  2. Steve!! A great way to save the township money would be for you to resign as mayor and have Bob sworn in again!! This would save money because it would not require any of the signs around town with the mayor’s name to change. This would thereby save money in printing costs, and manual labor. Think about it, Steve! You would be doing your part, to sacrafice on behalf of the taxpayers of this town!!

  3. #1 As a fellow tax payer and emergency responder i hope you’ll come out to a scene and assist me if i get hurt, if you’re so damn concerned about your taxes why dont you move somewhere where you dont have to pay taxes, the end of spruce st, the 9 and county line rd, etc.

  4. Some one is yet to explain to me
    How is it that a private company is willing to supply the same service plus and make money off it but our own ems is losing money hand over fist (be it 250,000 1,000,000) someone care to explain ?

  5. Ask the president of the FMBA if she shoveled her own snow too when the Lakewood EMS was doing figure eights with an ambulance in the snow at Blue Claws stadium last year.

    You can watch it at http://www.mycentraljersey.com/article/20090313/STATE/90313005/Watch-video-of-Lakewood-ambulance-doing-donuts-in-snow. If you google the story you’ll find it we were a national laughing stock. Total disregard of public property and money. Also, obviously too many bored employees with lots of spare time. If someone would have been hurt it would have been the township/tax payers responsibility.

    No one was fired then, but maybe it open some eyes as to where budget cuts should be made. Unfortunately, all cuts are painful.

  6. How can they possibly do a good job when they don’t have enough employees nor ambulances? What’s next? Privatizing public works, tax collections, LDC? Everyone knows the private companies bill the township more than paying employees. Wake up

  7. A town with almost 100,000 people ( tax payers ) and we can’t fund a local EMS or hire more Police, not to mention crossing guards at more intersections …. Go figure?

  8. Very simple . The EMS is unionized and gets large benefits and pensions .. The private company workers dont .

    The same reason that GM is bankrupt and Toyota is thriving . The Unions destroyed the company with their excessive demands .

  9. I think I agree with number #10. Are the current EMT workers willing to take pay cuts and normal 401K pensions like the rest of us in the real world?

  10. TLS,
    What was wrong with my comment about the EMS-Blue Claws Stadium fiasco? I thought it was written respectfully.

    You have no problem putting in Astonished ‘s comment on “Langert not having manners” when all he did was ask the public to limit their speech to the allotted time. Did your political patrons advise you that my comment wasn’t politically correct

  11. Why are the Lakewood EMS paid more than the MONOC Medics??
    Is it true that Lakewood’s EMS are the highest paid in the State or the Nation? Senator Bob Singer, why did you allow it to go in till now? The senior’s votes did it.

  12. They can’t take cuts because of the NJ State’s system of State arbitrators. The only way is by privatizing. The EMS is crying now, they rolled us taxpayers till now & we were crying.

  13. #10 Your point is weak The demise of certain empires wasnt destroyed by any unions it was simply (egos, greed, poor management ) that tore down those walls. That was proven just by the CEOs flying in to visit the president in their private jets to beg for monies surely you remember that?
    There was no UNION REPS to represent those CEOs They were forced to come back driving their own version of a hybrid. Pathetic!
    Don’t hate a union they are the ones responsible for a quality work force.
    you patronizing foriegn investors is what s helping us bury this U.S.A.

  14. What is it worth to pay an employee whos charged with saving your life at a moments notice? My sister was sitting at a red light minding her own buisness suddenly waking up to realize she can hardly breath and theres voices near her ear assurring her that everything will be alright. I later learned that she was hit by another car into her drivers door impaling the door frame into her ribs. If it wasnt for the expert services rendered by the Lakewood EMS that night well I rather not think of all the other possibilities. To some one who never experienced a sudden tramatic episode in their lives could possibly agree with getting rid of this vital service. Especially if you believe that your community organization will always be at the ready. But as we know thats just a fairy tale. And to believe that some pay for service employee or better a disgruntle employee who works for a company that forces them to work 16 hr shifts to make ends meet and are force to work this way cause they know theres a dime a dozen waiting to fill the position is going to answer the call but couldnt care much for the town its demographiics and since the bottom line is money couldnt or wouldnt help an elderly person off the floor to be put back into their chair unless they can pay either by insurance or cash. Who else will flip the bill ?? lakewood can’t we’re broke. Surely there are ways to save our medical saviors. Smoke and mirrors??
    I see this as the begining of a wonderful few years(SARCASIM) with these politicians currently in control. People of TLS please support your local EMS it will some day save your life.

  15. The fact of life is this: the EMT workers in Lakewood are paid far more then neighboring towns!!! They got themselves into this own mess by being greedy. Now, they can all go work for JEM ambulance at normal pay grades that their jobs pay in the private sector. If ethrye not willing to accept private sector jobs at what normal private sector employees make\, too bad on them. Most of us are private sector employees so why should they be different then us.

  16. HAHA!! number 19 thank you for the laugh. Private sectors are nothing like real EMS. These people dont pick you up at the hospital they make sure you stay alive to make it to the hospital. These people have much more training then a typical EMT, like how to get someone out of a car that is crushed. I dont think GEM has those tools or qualifications. Before you make statements you should first learn how to spell and second learn your facts about these jobs people do. If you keep typing your credibility just keeps going down. Its also amazing how Langert stated on this tape here that he has no ties to GEM but many people seem to think otherwise, i wonder who is telling the truth?????? Someone should really post the facts as to who owns GEM Ambulance and answer that question for everyone, is there a link between the 2??

  17. Lets look at how well the buses are working now that they went private. How much do you thing GEM is going to cost to drive someone without insurance to the hospital??

  18. some of you people need to get a grip on reality!!! the ems department does more for the residents that is NEVER seen spending extra time at patients houses getting them back in bed after thay have fallen,cooking food ( not ignoring other calls if they come in) all at no extra charge to resident,NO private co would do that.their saleries might be the highest but theyve been doing it for 30 years for this township and thyve earned it dont say they rolled the twp the twp approved the contracts for these employees. to say the emts are to blame for the towns money problems is so very wrong how much has the twp money wasted on nonsense the amount of houses that are places of worship come on people get real pay taxes on those houses . most private ambulance companys hire new emts just out of school compare that to the twp ems employee who has an average of 15 yrs experience.. these companys dont have all the same equipment the lakewood emts do support these PROUD twp employees

  19. Anonymous says:
    JANUARY 3, 2010 AT 9:09 PM
    gem is the way to go they ore not part of the union so they could aford it and have knowledgable staf

    Someone needs to go back to school and learn to spell check before entering a comment

  20. To Astonished and ems supporter,

    Deriding your orthodox Jewish neighbors will not help you win your argument. If anything it will show them who “you guys” really are.

    Comments like “You obviously did not watch the video of the EMS females speech. oh wait, you probably cant”, or “Houses that are places of worship come on people get real pay taxes on those houses”.

    Haters usually have a hard time hiding their really feelings for long.

    All budget cuts are painful. It would be great if it can be done in a way that no one suffers.

  21. this is not about steve langert or the lakewood EMS. this is about how government works. you cannot have a large group of people with government jobs, who have no accountability , get overpaid , have union protecting them for every wrong did that they do, it doesnt work because it will bring down the system . anything that can be privatized and that the public sector is forced to compete with private companies is good for the whole public , we need accountability not a group of people who control us. therefore any jobs that can me outsourced through a system that allows multiple open bids should be used. even if it is not actually outsourced the threat will keep them gov agencies up to par. with the exculsion of state sensitive security issues such as our army and police fors as that power cannot be given over to private people.

    and yes although it will never happen, if our public school system was given over to private comapnies our children would be getting twice the aducation at under half the price.

    somehow the 80% of our local children go to private school , and it cost $5000 -$6000 a child, of which at least half is going to jewish studies. and a of those who apply to collages from jewish private shools a lot more are getting accepted and graduating ( or at least the same amount ) than for our great lakewood public school system.
    more proof is that the private sector can do a better job at a fraction the cost in most cases.

  22. so the buses going private saved money??? that is crazy people put a low bid and once everything is sold off will up there price at the new contract. When are people going to learn you have no control over private companies. If GEM does get the contract then the the feds need to get involved and see how much Langert got paid. And then next year when the rates sky rocket I guess everyone will pay!

  23. I see that my comment was removed. The truth hurts! So much for free speech. I stated nothing that was’nt the truth. I used no profanity yet my comment was removed. Who owns TLS? Langert.

  24. To Astonished,

    I did see the clip and that is exactly what I was referring to. He told her very gently that he understands that this is an emotional issue but at that point she was just repeating herself and her point was made and it is only right to give others a turn.

    He was not rude, didn’t yell at her, just told her that her time was up. what did you want him to do go down and give her a hug.

    I (I don’t know about Langert) really do feel bad for her that her job, and those of her colleagues are getting downsized, but it happens every day in corporate America, it just seems that government employees feel that they should have immunity.

  25. The Lakewood EMT employees try to present their case as altruistic, sacrificing for others, but one of their three requests is that the union continues to represent them. If they were truly concerned only for the safety and welfare of Lakewood residents then their three demands would not include a self-serving, self-enriching, criterion of union representation but their demands would only be to serve the community. The emotional appeal by the President of the union was very touching but it was false. She places the enrichment of her union on an even level with her “selfless” desire to sacrifice for the people. This is clearly deception and hypocracy. She hasn’t thought through the transparency of her attempt to deceive. She is committed to serve…as long as her union, her monetary gain, and her position is advanced. This is not self sacrifice. This is falsehood. But her emotional appeal was touching, and seemed genuine, until one thinks about the facts.

  26. privatizing can be done through the wole town….you can privatize the police dept by having the state NJ State Police come in and patrol..I would like to see how everyone re-acts to that. Will they be as sensative to our needs like the LPD????how about garbage pick up??that can be privatized…again we will all suffer…taking away the EMS Dept. wont help our takes but only bring in people who wont understand us.would gem,monoc,quality open a door or turn off our lights during shabos??? I doubt it…look at the big picture and look to see whos really getting the big money in town…Is it really needed to pay a secretary for UEZ $80,000.00??? Lets stop the bull and cut out whats really not needed…Keep our EMS Dept. they help us when we call and are a big assistance to Hatzolah..Look at the other stories on here, like how they were the first ambulance ( not member ) on scene for the girl choking.They were there to assist Hatzolah in minutes…Ask the Hatzolah members that were there first,im sure they would agree….

  27. Langert u want to save money?Dont let any public employee take vehicles home.That will save a ton of money a year.Why every supervisor in town needs to take the trucks home?Make them drive their own vehicles to work and the town will save money.Every supervisor makes over $60,000.00 a year.Why pay them 2 hrs of overtime every day as a compensation for being there?They are getting pay.Langert and the rest of the comitee,if you want to save money to the town just work for free.No money,no benefits whatsoever and no pensions.That way you guys will show the people that you care.Mayor Bloomberg does it in NY.Why the town have so many secretaries for?Why we need 2 code enforcers for?Why we have to care for the stadium?Let the team pay for that also.Start charging $5.00 per trip at the public works yard when people go there to throw garbage and i bet you the town will make a lot of money and that extra money u can use it to SAVE THE EMS DEPT.Stop collecting bulk trash every week,just do it twice a year like the other towns around Lakewood do.

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