r/Firefighting • u/TigerBack56 • 7d ago

General Discussion Whats your departments dumbest/strangest policy?

So i come from a military background and I know how stupid some policies can be. Our department has a few i can think of but I wanted to here from the community, what is your departments dumbest/strangest legitimate policy?

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u/946stockton 7d ago edited 7d ago

I know a guy at a department that has violated their “conduct unbecoming” policy because he kept showing up on the “are we dating the same guy” Facebook page. All the girls kept saying bad shit about him from the dating apps. A girl complained to the department that he’s a man whore. The department wanted to fire him after the investigation. His lawyer threatened to counter sue for violating his civil rights. Now the department wants to give him 10 days on the beach. His union is fighting that. Told the skelly officer that the department can’t police his bedroom behavior.

Speaking of conduct unbecoming, their new fire chief a few years ago was arrested for DV.

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u/ShotDeal9 7d ago

A girl complained to the department?

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u/946stockton 7d ago

Yeah. She saw his picture in the news paper saving a dog or something at a fire. She recognize him from that Facebook page.

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u/Material-Win-2781 Volunteer fire/EMS 7d ago edited 7d ago

I had something similar happen due to my participation in some discussion groups some find suspicious. They mined through my posting history and were able to isolate my location, to where it was probably just one agency. There was a discussion with management that basically amounted to, please try to keep any particularly controversial discussion isolated from the department.

This alt was born and I'm alot less specific about my location.

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u/fish1552 FF/EMT who thankfully doesn't have to do medical 6d ago

Oh, 100% you should NEVER include your dept info in your social media or any online location. I voiced my opinion about someone one day and kept my wording VERY unspecific. The Chief somehow saw it and complained in a meeting. One of the BCs asked if he saw a employer anywhere on that profile? Then asked did he mention any names or places? If not, then YOU are only assuming to know who he was speaking about. Then he finished it up with (my name) isn't stupid. He didn't break any rules or policies.
They all knew who I was talking about and I made sure nobody could ever figure out what dept I was talking about. And I make sure to share posts from multiple dept in the area so they can't even use those to guess.
For any management guys reading this, I would jump in front of a bullet for that BC, now an AC, as he's VERY well respected by the guys and they are loyal to him. For reasons like I explained.

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u/Material-Win-2781 Volunteer fire/EMS 5d ago

I would never put out my specific department but sometimes it can be difficult to avoid disclosing a geographic location, give or take 20 mi. That could easily narrow you down to a couple agencies.

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u/946stockton 5d ago

He never posted photos in uniform/on duty, etc.

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u/triton8890 7d ago

This exact thing has happened three times in my department.