Subject: One small stop for man, One Giant Leap for Mankind

On Thanksgiving Day 2001 after seeing firefighters in the open bay of their fire-station, I thought, "Its Thanksgiving, someone should say 'Thank You' to them", so I turned the car around and stopped "to say thank you". Many other stops "to say thank you" have been made since that time, and I have started a website called "to say thank you" (www.ToSayThankYou.com). As I have learned more about the fire service, I have discovered an ISO Class rating system, which goes from 1 to 10--1 being the best, 10 the worst. When the Houston Fire Department joined the ranks of the very small group of ISO Class 1 fire departments (44 of 44,898) I discovered that $47 million had been spend to achieve that status. I inquired, hoping that they have achieve some benefit for that $47 million. The answer a $401 million savings, which is per year and would apply each year of the rating difference. But, that was not the complete answer, the $401 million was for homeowners, and the estimation was that the commercial property owners would see three times that saving, all through reduced insurance premiums—a $1.6 billion total savings per year.

I have thought that if less than 1% of the population of the United States could make that kind of savings, what would happen if you changed the scale to all of the fire departments across the United States-- $231,057,316,977 per year, or $2.3 trillion over a ten year period--possibly even greater savings than that.

I have wondered why someone else was not brought this up, and I see a lot of the same reasons that were in play with the September 11th attack. Sharing knowledge, separation of powers (different cities and towns), level of authority (just another one of the city departments or divisions), a lot of fires to put out already (literally), budget problems (fighting and in many cases losing for what they already have--Cleveland, Ohio for example), and complexity of the ISO rating system. Standing were I am, which is supporting my fire department, as well as, a supporter to all firefighters/fire departments drives me to do what I can to bring this to the attention of people that could help change the course of human events.

I have put together a webpage, which I hope will be helpful to anyone that cares to learn more www.ToSayThankYou.com/ISO/, and the special webpage for the CASPERS ISO Initiative www.ToSayThankYou.com/CaspersISOInitiative.htm.

I am not asking for my country to do anything for me, but I am asking for you to do something for the country.

Thank you for your time,

Gary

Caring Aiding and Supporting People in Emergency Rescue Service
not an organization, but simply a name used to express an idea, and goal.