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Vail Daily letter: ‘Yes’ to Eagle River Fire

Chances are you haven’t needed your cat removed from a tree lately, or a fire in your house extinguished, or CPR administered to you or a loved one. If you have, chances are you can stop reading this, as you’re most likely already in support of the upcoming ballot initiative to improve the infrastructure for Eagle River Fire Protection District.

Fortunately we don’t all need the fire department to help us on a regular basis, but if we do it’s quite possibly on one of the worst days of our lives, and we’ll most likely need the best trained firefighters responding as quickly as possible. In the medical world, the difference between CPR that gets blood and oxygen to the brain and saves a life and CPR that doesn’t can be seconds. When a fire is burning in a building or in the wilderness the same applies to a fire that is caught in the incipient stages and a fire that tears through a building leaving nothing salvageable in its path. The infrastructure improvements this initiative will provide will definitively improve response times to emergencies throughout Eagle County. The proposed training facility will allow firefighters to master their craft in a controlled setting so they’re better prepared when they find themselves in a burning building that doesn’t have much for room for error.

I’m not much with numbers and certainly can’t put a price on a human life or the contents of your home; however, $4 a month extra in taxes on a $500,000 home to greatly improve the infrastructure of your local fire department is a deal even the fiscally conservative should be able to appreciate. A “yes” vote on Eagle River Fire Protection District ballot question A will ensure that we have well trained fire personnel responding in a timely manner to our emergencies. One of the many cats, houses or lives this will facilitate saving could one day be yours or your loved ones.



Josh Eaton

President, Vail Professional Firefighters Association, Local 4138


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