Dear Editor,
What a tough 10 weeks our community has endured. There has been a roller coaster of changes that have affected everyone in Oxford. We can assure the residents of Oxford that your fire fighters have been working diligently through this pandemic to make sure the residents stay safe. The Fire Chief has temporarily increased staffing for both fire stations around the clock. He has also changed many procedures of the Fire Department to keep us and our community members safe. These changes ensure cleanliness in the fire stations and in our emergency apparatus. We thank him for his quick action in getting additional personnel into the station to handle this difficult time.
The Oakland County Medical Control Authority (OCMCA) is the agency that allows our Fire Department to provide Advanced Life Support medicine to our residents. They have educated our personnel with daily, updated information on Covid-19 and also implemented changes in EMS policies and procedures. These updates increased our daily training requirements in order to facilitate these changes in policies and procedures in performing emergency medicine. We thank them for their assistance in continuance of our safety and patient care while allowing us to continue to practice medicine.
Several residents have stopped by the fire stations and dropped off needed personal protective equipment to assist our first responders in protecting ourselves and protecting the patients we have been treating. Also several of our local elected officials, including Oxford Township Trustee Jack Curtis and Oakland County Commissioner Mike Spisz, have made multiple phone calls to our membership to ensure we had the proper protective gear we needed to handle this virus. We thank these residents and elected officials for their aid to our Department in this unprecedented time.
Many of our great, local, small businesses, organizations and residents have dropped off meals/food/snacks to our Fire Department during this pandemic. While we would never ask or request these donations, we can assure you they were thoroughly enjoyed by our fire fighters. There were so many donations; we aren’t able to list every single business and organization. We just want them to know they, along with their donations are appreciated! Thank you to the many Oxford individual residents and families who also donated food and gift cards.
Thank you to all the residents for your trust, respect and support for all these years! We look forward on continually serving this great community. Please don’t hesitate to contact 911 in the event of an emergency. Your fire fighters and Paramedics are here and ready to serve you.
Kevin C. Snell, President
Oxford Fire Fighters Union, IAFF L4763