Meeting Report - Sep, 2009

The regular meeting of the LONG ISLAND EMERGENCY VEHICLE TECHNICIANS was held on Wednesday, September 9, 2009 at the Hauppauge FD. Eugene Oliver and Christian Inoa did a great job in the kitchen – the food was excellent – they enjoyed the LIEVT chefs’ hats they were presented with. About fifty members were in attendance.

At 8 PM the meeting was opened by the President, Steve Velazquez, who led the pledge to the flag. He had distributed the minutes of the May meeting – he asked the members to make a motion to accept the minutes – Paul Sailon made a motion – it was seconded by Mike Buglione – the minutes were accepted.

The treasurer, Paul Sailon, read his report. To date, we have 78 paid members this year – we had a total of 116 in 2008. The unpaid members were reminded to send their checks. We have completed a timely filing with the IRS.

Steve introduced the webmaster, Nate Berry, IT Director of FRC who does a great job with our website. [thanks Steve! - Nate] Members were told to watch the website for dates for EVT preparation and testing. We are still looking for the attendees at the Weldon class in 2008 to get certificates to them. Steve distributed a sheet (61Kb PDF) to the members asking them to make notes of their recommendations for upcoming meetings. The officers will use this as a planning guide.

Steve introduced Jim Cottrell and Dan Tyrrell of Cottrell Associates, Inc from North Carolina. Jim had done a program for the members in 2007 and there were regular requests for his return to Long Island.

• Jim left some copies of a CD with a lot of information and videos, but there is too much information on the disk to post it all on this site. As a compromise, here is a link (6.5Mb PDF) to the presentation he was running during the meeting (his presentation covered a LOT more information than just this, and Jim definitely does NOT just read from his notes!)
• Jim also left a copy of an article he wrote for Fire Chief Magazine last year entitled Solving Eductor Problems (360Kb PDF) that may be of interest to our members.

Jim is recognized nationally as a wealth of information on every aspect of foam. He is Chairman of the IFSTA Foam Technical Committee and a member of the Underwriter Laboratories, Foam Standards Panel as well as an accomplished investigator, instructor , writer and lecturer. After the riveting presentation, the members were given literature and a CD for reference on types of foam, storage, shelf life, etc. The Q & A and comments were excellent.

Plaques were presented to Jim Cottrell and the Hauppauge Board of Fire Commissioners. A raffle was held with very nice items from the Hauppauge FD, Jim Cottrell Associates, Fire News, Fire Research and Waterway Hose Testing.

The group was reminded to check www.lievt.org for the latest association information. Information can be on the website instantly – we do not do a mailing until every last bit of information is correct (postage was raised to .44 – PLEASE SUPPLY US WITH AN EMAIL ADDRESS IF WE DON’T HAVE ONE FOR YOU. See photos of the meeting on the website and click on any picture to see photos from previous meetings.

The next meeting will be in Setauket in October. Steve asked for a Nassau host department for the November meeting. Watch the website for dates.