[music playing] ANNOUNCER: The following program is a production of Ozarks Public Television.

Welcome to Sense of Community.

I'm Jennifer Moore.

Tonight's guest has been on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic from the beginning.

Chief David Pennington of the Springfield Fire Department has worked with health officials to organize vaccine clinics and provide free COVID testing.

All while his crews were responding to medical emergencies and fires.

Join us for an update from the fire chief on Sense of Community.

[music playing] Welcome to Sense of Community.

Sense of Community is a public affairs presentation of Ozarks Public Television.

Chief David Pennington, thank you so much for joining us tonight.

Thank you for having me.

It's a pleasure to be here.

We've got a lot to talk about, I'm very excited about our conversation.

Before we begin, I want to remind our viewers that we are distanced more than usual because we want to maintain those safety distancing requirements and recommendations due to the pandemic.

Also, all of our staff here in the studio are masked.

So we want to talk tonight about the fire department's role in the pandemic.

The Springfield Fire Department has taken a leading role throughout the pandemic.

More recently, in vaccinating the community.

Why would a fire department take-- take such a leadership position in vaccinating?

What was a good fit about that?

Sure, so as-- as I watched the pandemic kind of spread across our community, particularly the surge with Delta, we knew that the-- the need was overwhelming.

That we have 12 fire stations across the city that are staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week with licensed medical professionals who are EMTs.

They're trained and licensed to respond to all manner of medical emergencies.

And they're very wonderful people doing a tough job.

They have a good rapport with the community.

We're trusted in the community.

So we know that as the pandemic worsened in the hospitals were overwhelmed.

And the need for providing vaccine, we can use our trust in the community to access possibly that-- that part of the community who weren't going to go to a clinic, or they were unwilling to go to a mass site but they trust the firefighters.

We opened our fire stations.

We were aggressive in doing so simply because we knew we could be part of the solution.

Initially, in our region especially, there was a lot of vaccine hesitancy.

There still is.

What role do you think that trust played in allowing firefighters to be really a vehicle for vaccination?

So on one specific occasion, I have a young lady who came to a clinic where I was assisting with vaccine.

And she looked puzzled and somewhat confused, and as I asked her if I could help her she kept repeating, I don't know why-- I can't believe I'm here.

She was completely anti-vaccine But she was there because it was at the fire station and it was a safe place to be.

So that hesitation comes from a myriad of reasons, whether it's personal or philosophical.

We've seen resistance for a number of reasons that continues.

A lot of people are waiting.

And we think even, based on a health and Human Services report recently published that a large demographic of the population are waiting to see what comes next.

The long-term effects of the vaccine, I can tell you the vaccine is safe.

There is no ulterior motive in the vaccine.

It's there to prevent you from getting desperately ill or dying from-- from COVID.

So we continue to provide that if it's necessary.

We're in a bit of a lull now in terms of our administration of the vaccine from the fire department.

But we know with the age demographics coming open soon that 5- to 12-year-olds, there may be another opportunity for us to assist there or through the booster shots.

Right, now your fire department has been busy in terms of vaccinating and events.

Tell us a little bit about how that has unfolded this year in particular?

So, it's interesting that the pandemic created opportunities, as we chose to see it.

A lot of our activities, all of our community relations activities, were suspended.

The firehouses were closed in order to prevent unnecessary exposure of the firefighters to the community.

We even altered some of our response patterns to ensure that we didn't have duplication of service with the EMS.

Because there's only one fire department, so my concern for firefighter health and safety and our ability to continue to provide longevity of service modified a lot of what we were doing.

Which created time.

And as we had time, we knew that we had the opportunity through modifications and state legislation to allow our EMTs to administer shots, which they don't typically do.

We had the opportunity through our partnership with the Health Department and their support, which are amazing people by the way.

And we have the facilities, so you consider a fire department as an all-hazards response agency.

We don't just go to fires, in fact, it's one of the smallest percentage activities that we do.

That's a very high risk but a lot of what we do are EMS-related or medical emergency-related.

They're, again, skilled licensed providers, and we had that opportunity to open our doors in a way that was meaningful to reduce the exposure to the community from COVID.

Yeah, I think that's one thing that a lot of people in our community don't realize is just how many medical emergency calls firefighters respond to.

And I have a question.

Are all firefighters licensed EMTs?

They are in the city of Springfield.

is our level of practice.

We have a medical director, Dr. Jake Spain from Mercy Health Systems as their medical director.

But we partner with both Mercy and Cox health during our training and our response.

They're all licensed and they go through our education program at the Fire Academy, and are licensed as a result.

Springfield Fire Department has been responding to a lot of medical calls that are COVID-related throughout the pandemic.

Tell us about some of the types of calls that you respond to.

Typically, at least during-- during COVID, they were difficulty breathing or shortness of breath.

Unfortunately respiratory arrest and cardiac arrest secondary to COVID infection.

Normally in a non-COVID year, we respond to anything you might call 911 for.

We respond frequently with the police department on-- on issues.

Matters pertaining to police, we are always responding with the EMS.

So if you're having a heart attack or you've sprained your ankle and you call 911 the fire department is going to respond.

It's about anywhere from 68% to 72% depending upon the year of our total call volume.

So the bulk of what we do is medical-related.

So how is that determined, who or which agency will respond?

Whether it is the call will go to the fire department or to a hospital to send an ambulance or both?

How is that determined?

That's a good question.

The, the fire department will respond if you call 911 and you are having an emergency that meets a criteria of 11 critical life threats.

We will respond immediately.

We have the ability because we're spread out across the city geographically in 12 fire stations, of often and generally arriving before EMS will.

So you're going to get care from us anywhere from four to six minutes from the time you place the call until we arrive at your bedside and start providing care.

EMS is typically in that two to three minutes behind us.

They are sending the closest unit.

They can both see each other's units on a system that they utilize and you get the closest ambulance service to your emergency.

So it's a very dynamic process.

It all goes through the Springfield Greene County 911 Emergency Communications Department.

And then gets routed to the appropriate dispatch center for the hospitals which are separate from-- from our 911 center.

Wow, the Springfield Fire Department has also been very involved in testing for COVID-19 throughout the pandemic and one point for several months there was a fire station site dedicated to testing of COVID-19.

That is currently not offering that service, is that right?

That's right.

We're suspended for now.

But it's based on the needs and desires of the Health Department.

Again, they're incredibly talented folks but a very small core group.

And what we observed was they were outside the Health Department and the Fire Department Headquarters or near one another.

And they're outside in the heat and the rain and the wind.

And we had the ability, again, in one of our firehouses that's adjacent to a community room to kind of move some of our assets around and provide them a sheltered place to be and an air-conditioned place to be.

When they're not out, you know, providing testing.

And it created a drive-thru environment where no one has to get out of their vehicle.

It was safe.

It was secure.

More than happy to do it for them and we would do it again if necessary.

Springfield and Greene County have seen-- have had an uphill battle in terms of reaching the benchmarks that they had originally hoped to achieve in terms of vaccination.

And initially, there was a lot of demand for the vaccine.

And then those numbers pretty much dropped.

They came up a little again in terms of demand for the summer, for the Delta surge.

What are you seeing now this fall here in October in terms of demand for the vaccine?

The numbers are still slow.

We are still providing vaccine.

We still have clinics that are popping up.

We certainly aren't seeing the volume that we did initially.

We think when we start going through booster shots, we're starting to see an uptick there again.

A lot of first-time vaccine patients we're not having, but we hope that we do.

And we hope that those who would want this will be open to coming to get it.

We think with the increase in availability for a new age demographic that the numbers will increase.

Most of our circulation right now in our community's in the schools.

And the opportunity to vaccinate our younger kids is going to be really key to hopefully having a happy Christmas and moving into the spring where some of these restrictions can be relaxed.

So, there has been some hesitancy of the vaccine even among your ranks, in firefighters.

What is the vaccination rate currently among Springfield Fire Department and why do you think there is hesitancy still?

Sure, so we're at 56% of our staff has been fully vaccinated.

And you know, the-- because it's not mandated, it is an option.

There are those who have one reason or another as to why they-- they choose not to-- to take the vaccine.

Certainly, I respect their positions but I again always advocate for them to be fully vaccinated.

I think it's in our best interest in the protection of the community to do that.

And certainly, we continue to advocate for that.

What are some of the common reasons you hear from them?

Well, they-- you know, anything from, my wife and I you know want to have children later and we're concerned about long term effects which they were unknown-- A lot of those concerns have been discredited through a lot of the studies that are going on.

But generally, my position is to advocate I make that available to them.

And then it should they choose not to I don't get into the politics of it.

At one point during the height of the Delta surge this summer here in Greene County, you tweeted that there was a mass casualty event taking place in slow motion and that EMS and ambulances were overwhelmed.

I'm just wondering, can you take us back there, first of all?

And then the second part of that is to ask, do you think that could happen again in Greene County perhaps with a different variant?

Sure, so a mass casualty event is something that would be declared any time your resources are overwhelmed.

So, if you are inundated, the available resources are not sufficient to address the patient load that you have or the situation that is occurring.

We typically would see a mass casualty event as a result of a large accident with a lot of casualties or unfortunately a mass casualty due to a shooting of some sort.

This was different.

We had the volume but it was creeping.

And it was continuing to escalate in volume in a way that overwhelmed our emergency rooms.

That depleted our resources.

That we were prepared for, but it was at such a state in reaction so quickly, particularly during Delta, that we couldn't adapt fast enough.

I think it's possible any time you have an airborne virus.

There are a lot of them that could cause a problem.

I think the biggest risk to a community, particularly a density of the community, is from a respiratory-borne virus.

We see it every year with the flu.

The flu has typically been managed through a vaccine, but it is possible through some sort of catastrophic viral you know, assault that we could see this again.

The variants that we see right now Lambda and Mu, thankfully, are pretty-- they're aggressive but somewhat docile.

So we hope that those stay that way.

And we don't adapt into something new that's worse.

Will the fire department play a role in the booster vaccine?

If necessary, we've made ourselves available.

Katie Towns with the health department knows we're a phone call away.

We will be providing boosters.

We have done some on a limited capacity.

We intend to have clinics for our firefighters as well.

But if there's a need, we'll certainly be there.

I'm wondering if you can share one or two of the anecdotes or one or two of the stories that you have heard of people who decided to get the vaccine through the fire department.

One of my favorite-- we had a clinic just across the street here at Fire Station Number 1, across from the studio.

And it was a fairly slow day.

We've been providing a reasonable amount of vaccines.

And in the door burst many large men who happen to be part of Missouri State Football.

They had a day off from practice and they decided amongst this group of approximately 20 that they were going to go get vaccinated.

And they all came over to the clinic and just filled the room.

Certainly, their energy was infectious and they were a great group of young men.

And thankful we're seeing them doing well on the football field, not getting infected.

But you know, it's amazing what a little needle can do to very large, large men.

So that's a fun story.

I won't disclose who that was.

So the fire department has also been out at many events at parks.

I mean, it's just been all over the place, right?

Aside from the fire stations, we've had pop-up clinics in parking lots.

We partnered with our legislators to have a one, up in North Central Springfield.

We've gone to Nights Out.

We've been you know, anywhere that we thought there was an audience that we could reach, that demographic who's unlikely to come to any other place or weren't available during those times.

We were willing to go where they were and meet the need where, where it was at.

And.

I think it's been successful I'm wondering if you are able to share, based on what you have heard and what you've seen in the community, why there has been hesitancy across the community in terms of the vaccine?

You know, it's hard to pinpoint why.

I think there's been a disservice based on the large volume of misinformation that was introduced early on a national level.

I think that was seized onto.

It's difficult to change someone's mind when they've read something that more closely associated with their beliefs.

I think we've-- we've been challenging that all along.

It's been phrased that it's an infodemic, related to the pandemic.

I think there's a lot of that.

I think there was concern about how quickly we arrived at the vaccine.

But again, this has been it's tied to research that's been going on for decades related to HIV/AIDS.

There again, immensely talented scientists working on this and it was clearly vetted in a way that we knew it was safe.

So it's difficult.

It's individual-- why someone would not want to take this.

And we've heard a lot of different reasons why.

So October is Fire Prevention Month.

It is.

And I would be remiss on a community program, not to mention that the Springfield Fire Department website has some really great resources in terms of preventing fires, particularly residential fires, including one called the Home Safety Checklist.

So I'm just wondering if you can tell us what is a Home Safety Checklist and perhaps give us a few items that are on that checklist.

Sure, it's a guide for homeowners and residents to make sure that their home is safe from fire.

Whether that's ensuring you have the right number of smoke alarms and that they're working, they need a battery in them to make them work.

And to test those on a regular basis.

To housekeeping issues to just general safety items that we have found over the years.

For example, misuse of an extension cord that could lead to a fire.

It's one of the leading causes of fire in our community.

Safe cooking practices about how to ensure that your appliances are set up correctly or where you don't have a combustibles near the appliance.

It's those types of things we want to remind everyone to this will decrease your risk of having a fire in the home.

And then another resource on the website is the Home Fire Escape Plan walk us through what that is.

Everyone should have an escape plan in the event of a fire or emergency in their home.

And they should have two ways to escape.

It's frequent that we leave a room with the door we went in.

Unfortunately, if that door is blocked by fire you need another way out.

It's a great, fun time with your kids to start planning, hey how would you get out of the house if you needed to?

What turns from a game to an important function in the event of an emergency is that it's practiced and known by everyone.

And you have a meeting place to go to.

That way when I arrive or other firefighters arrive we can meet you in your meeting place.

And ask you if everyone is out of the home because if we're going to check but it's certainly nice for you to say, yes I have my, my children.

They're all here.

They followed the plan.

They knew what to do and they're out of the home safely.

And speaking of children, during this month you and others have been very busy going into schools as part of an awareness plan right?

Yeah this is Fire Prevention Month, and thankfully, very appreciatively to the Springfield Public Schools over the last four or five years, we've been really building our relationship with them and local private schools and preschools.

And during the month we are in every elementary classroom and a lot of preschool classrooms within the system providing age-appropriate curriculum about fire safety.

So it could be practicing escape plans with our first graders to microwave safety with our fifth graders.

So it's to ensure that everyone is safe they-- they-- they know how to function safely in their home.

And try and avoid those emergencies, which could result in an injury or a fire.

And you were telling me, chief, just before the show that you have heard some feedback from children who have survived a fire, a house fire, that employed some of the techniques they learned in those presentations.

That must feel very rewarding, first of all, to hear that feedback.

But what are some of the things that you teach children?

So we teach them how to get low under smoke.

They learned the chant, Get out stay out.

And they don't go back in.

And unfortunately, you would see someone escape, and then want to get their favorite whatever.

And could go back inside.

We teach them how to make a fire escape plan and to create a meeting place.

How to use a microwave safely so you don't inadvertently put metal in a microwave And result in a fire.

Or how to turn a pot handle in so a younger sibling doesn't, you know, become injured because they pull the pot off the stove.

So we teach them the gambit of what you might think of would keep you safe in your home.

From, you know, the six-year-old to the 12-year-old.

And then we're-- we're in the schools and the high schools, working with the juniors doing CPR, AED, and Heimlich maneuver training.

That will be on the heels of October Fire Prevention Month when we start to see them again.

Wow.

Getting back to the issue of the pandemic in the few minutes that we have left here on the program, I'm wondering if you can kind of paint us a broad picture of where you see the fire department going in the next few months in terms of how it's been impacted overall by the pandemic.

Are your numbers holding steady?

Are-- is your recruiting impacted?

Give us a sense of the fire department's over all impact.

Sure.

We chose to see the pandemic as an opportunity.

It's not often you stop the bulk of what you're doing outside of emergency response.

So the reduction of all of our community engagement programs and a lot of our outreach programs was a lot of how we spend our days.

Pulling back on a lot of our call volume because we were under a different response protocol gave us the time to critically analyze all of our program areas and say, are we doing this the right way?

Is it having the effect that we want?

Do we want to continue that?

It gave us the ability to rethink a lot of that.

Thankfully, it hasn't affected our recruiting.

We have a Fire Academy happening right now.

They'll graduate in December.

There's 14 new members of the Department which have passed all of their initial fire attack training and we're preparing for their medical training.

So that's good.

We know that there's always chance for us to do things better and we've been using that-- this time that's been afforded us to do that, and I think it's been valuable.

Yeah it's true to say that there's no one person who is coming out of the pandemic the same person we went into it as.

I assume that it's the same for agencies.

If you could pinpoint one thing that's going to be different going forward what might it be?

You know, it's hard to probably pinpoint one thing.

I think we-- we have all learned something about every part of the department that we could either modify or adjust.

Certainly we-- we were impacted by supply chain shortages early on where we believed we were prepared and found that you know, we weren't quite where I wanted us to be.

And So one of the things that we're doing is always ensuring our supply system is intact in a way that probably is a little bit overkill, but we're not going to find ourselves shorted by emergency equipment again.

Primarily medical supplies like gloves, which were very hard to find in the beginning.

Right, and lastly, I want to give an opportunity to-- to talk about-- a little bit about your journey through the Springfield Fire Department.

You've been with us a long time in terms of the Springfield Fire Department.

I have, I'm coming up on 24 years.

So I'm excited every day I get to put on my uniform.

It was a gift the day I was hired.

It doesn't seem like it's been that long ago, but I started as a firefighter in the Fire Academy.

And have worked my way through the ranks to arrive here and have served in many roles.

And I'm just appreciative of the opportunity to continue to serve the community.

Real quickly, looking back at those early days of training, is there anything that stands out that would have prepared you for a pandemic?

Of course, no one could have seen it coming, but what do you think prepared you?

I think all of it has contributed in some way to our ability to adapt.

In 24 years, you see a lot of things that-- what prepared me, you know, it's not just me doing this.

I have a wonderful team I have 14 chief officers.

I have 39 other supervisors.

We have the support of the community, which is the key for us.

At every point, during the pandemic or not, the community has always been there for the fire department and we'll continue to do the very same thing for them.

David Pennington, Chief of the Springfield Fire Department, thank you very much for talking to us.

Appreciate it.

Thank you for having me.

And, we are going to leave you with some information, websites, and phone numbers where you can go to learn more information, including about those safety plans from the Springfield Fire Department.

I'm Jennifer Moore.

And thank you so much for joining us tonight.

Good night Here is where you can find more information about the topics covered in this program.

[music playing]