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From: Suzanne Chowla <br />To: GRP -City Council <br />Subject: Please do not cut the Fire Department budget & do not temporarily close our downtown fire station (E9) <br />Date: Monday, October 26, 2020 5:34:51 PM <br />Dear Mayor, Vice Mayor & Redwood City Council, <br />I urge you not to vote to cut funding to the Fire Department. <br />The police should not be getting an increase in funding in almost precisely <br />the amount that Redwood City is considering cutting from the fire <br />department. That is not acceptable at all. <br />We, your constituents, voted in November 2018 for Measure RR to raise <br />our own taxes to maintain public safety, especially including the fire <br />department, after Redwood City's own questionnaire revealed that public <br />safety was our top budget priority. <br />Even a temporary closure of the downtown fire station is not acceptable <br />nor reasonable. <br />With wildfire response now needed virtually year-round at literally record <br />levels, and DURING A PANDEMIC, we do not want our busiest fire station <br />to be closed and we do not want slower response times resulting from this <br />cut. Absolutely not. <br />The engine (E9), whose temporary closure you will vote on tonight, is <br />historically the busiest engine in San Mateo County and runs nearly <br />3000 calls for service a year. We have seen continual increases in fires (89 <br />percent over the past 5 years) in addition to an overall increase in calls. <br />This leaves us with an ever expanding downtown district with no water or <br />apparatus with pumping capabilities. <br />This cut would be very irresponsible in terms of your obligation to maintain <br />public safety and to represent the budget priorities of the residents who <br />you represent, which were made crystal clear to you quite recently <br />(in November 2018). <br />Budget cuts must be made on something other than our most essential <br />first responders (who happened to have saved my life, therefore I know <br />firsthand how critical very rapid response times are - even seconds can <br />matter to survival in life and death emergencies). Any slowing of response <br />time (even a temporary one) from our fire department is unacceptable and <br />must be avoided. <br />We all know that if over $20 million dollars had not been wasted on the <br />destruction of Docktown, we would not be in this fiscal predicament. Better <br />fiscal judgment is required going forward, including not cutting funding to <br />