Convention was a community effort
IN THE CITY
by Grant Spinney
As most of you are all aware, the Presque Isle Fire Department hosted the 47th annual Maine State Federation of Fire Fighters Convention on Sept. 10-12. This proved to be a very successful weekend, not just for the Presque Isle Fire Department, but also for several local businesses throughout Aroostook County.
In January of 2008, the PIFD was approached by the Federation to host this event nearly three years in advance. The last two times Presque Isle hosted such an event was in 1979 and ‘89. Soon after the request came in, I was personally asked by several of our Paid Call members if I would lead this event and become the Convention Chairman. Though we still had members that were here in 1989, I personally was not. My career did not start with the Star City’s fire department until ‘98. I accepted the challenge and soon after made plans to attend the 2008 Convention which was held in Boothbay Harbor, and also the 2009 Convention in Kennebunk. This gave our staff the opportunity to see how these Departments were handling their challenges. I spent a lot of my time with members of Presque Isle talking to firefighters about what they were enjoying the most and the least.
January of 2009, after we absorbed most of all we could from the information we received at Boothbay’s Convention, we organized a list of willing members that would fill in as Committee Chairperson’s under my direction. The first goal I made for myself was to make sure that all three organizations in our Department (Full-Time Staff, Paid-Call Volunteers and Ladies Auxiliary) were united. Our Co-Chair and Veteran to past Conventions held in Presque Isle was Dale Morrison. (full-time staff). The remaining Committee members were Aaron Buzza (paid-call), Finance Committee; Scott Marquis (paid-call), Trophy Committee; Richard Wark (full-time staff), Judging Committee; Vince Baldwin (full-time staff) Business Meeting Committee; Tania Baldwin (Ladies Aux president) Registration Committee; Dave Lovely (paid-call) Yearbook Committee; and Adam Rider (full-time staff) Parade Committee.
As months progressed, we started our planning stages. Our goal was to be able to attend the 2009 Convention in Kennebunk and be able to announce what our agenda was going to be, something that most fire departments rarely are able to do a year out from their own event. We successfully completed that goal!
We had confirmed that Randy Mantooth from the TV show “Emergency” was booked for our event. We confirmed and booked comedian Bob Marley as our entertainment. We also confirmed the arrival of Big Red, the largest monster truck in the world. Prior to arriving in Kennebunk, we mailed flyers to be stuffed into every firefighter’s registration bag stating our agenda. When I arrived in Kennebunk at 3 p.m. on Sept 11 2009, I received a phone call that one of our local hotels was already booked a year in advance. We knew then we were on the right track.
After returning from Kennebunk, we knew we had the firefighters’ attention statewide. Calls started coming in wanting to know when registration packets would be sent out as rarely do fire departments register early. We now knew that firefighters were going to attend in an alarming increase from previous years. I set a goal of doubling the attendance from approximately 250 firefighters to 500. My next goal was to also double attendance of fire departments represented from 35 to 70. Then a goal was set to double the attendance of vendors from 15 to 30.
Needless to say, we exceeded all of our goals. The Presque Isle Fire Dept. entertained approximately 700 firefighters that weekend. We had 74 departments represented statewide and 47 vendors from all over New England. Our parade had 115 entries with approximately 350 units total, being the largest parade the Star City has ever seen. Many of our members were told by several participants throughout the weekend that “This is the biggest and best convention ever.”
The PIFD has 49 members total, 16 full-time and 33 paid-call members. We have an active staff of nine Ladies Auxiliary, 40 other spouses, and significant others who also attended to work this event giving us a total staffing of 96 individuals. I want to personally thank every one of them for all the hard work put into this event from the early planning stages right through until the weekend ended. This event brought not only our department closer but also created new and stronger friendships.
Besides being very successful with all attendance goals, we are able to meet many donation goals as well. We raised and donated $2,250 to Camp Sunshine from giving rides on Big Red and also with the raffle we had for the parade. We raised $500 raffling a Cancer Pink fire helmet in which we will donate half to our local C-A-N-C-E-R group and half to our rescue snowmobile fund that will later offset a purchase of one. We also donated $980 dollars to our local Shrine Club for their participation in our parade. These funds will in turn be sent to support the nearest Shrine Hospital. In addition we helped raise money with the Presque Isle Kiwanis group. Those proceeds will also benefit our rescue snowmobile account. We would like to thank the group for helping with our parking at the Bob Marley show as well.
The Presque Isle Fire Department would also like to thank all the area businesses that gave us support both with sponsorship donations and with donations of service or materials, without your support we would of not been able to be so successful.
Grant Spinney was chair of the 2010 MSFFF Convention.
