1 1 COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA SENATE OF PENNSYLVANIA AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 2 SENATE AND HOUSE VETERANS AFFAIRS EMERGENCY 3 PREPAREDNESS COMMITTEE 4 STATE FIRE ACADEMY 150 RIVERSIDE DRIVE 5 LEWISTOWN, PA 17044 6 TUESDAY, AUGUST 14, 2018 10:10 A.M. 7 PUBLIC HEARING - EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS COMMITTEE JOINT 8 HEARING ON THE SENATE RESOLUTION 6 COMMISSION 9 BEFORE: REPRESENTATIVE STEPHEN BARRAR, 10 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN REPRESENTATIVE FRANK FARRY 11 REPRESENTATIVE TIMOTHY O'NEAL REPRESENTATIVE R. LEE JAMES 12 REPRESENTATIVE FRANCIS RYAN REPRESENTATIVE RICK SACCONE 13 REPRESENTATIVE WILL TALLMAN REPRESENTATIVE CHRIS SAINATO, 14 MINORITY CHAIRMAN REPRESENTATIVE CAROL HILL-EVANS 15 REPRESENTATIVE BRYAN BARBIN REPRESENTATIVE DOM COSTA 16 REPRESENTATIVE SCOTT CONKLIN REPRESENTATIVE DAN FRANKEL 17 REPRESENTATIVE GARY DAY 18 SENATOR RANDY VULAKOVICH, CHAIRMAN SENATOR SCOTT HUTCHINSON 19 SENATOR ANDREW DINNIMAN 20 21 22 23 24 25 SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 2 1 COMMITTEE STAFF PRESENT: THOMAS DYMEK 2 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, REPUBLICAN RESEARCH DEPARTMENT 3 CHRIS DONATO 4 DEMOCRATIC CHAIRMAN, 9TH DISTRICT 5 NATE SILCOX SENATE VETERANS AFFAIRS AND EMERGENCY 6 PREPAREDNESS COMMITTEE 7 RON JUMPER EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SENATE MINORITY 8 RICK O'LEARY 9 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 10 MICHAEL HILLMAN DEMOCRATIC EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, HOUSE OF 11 REPRESENTATIVES 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 3 1 I N D E X 2 OPENING REMARKS 3 By Chairman Barrar 4 4 INTRODUCTIONS 4 - 7 5 OPENING REMARKS By Chairman Vulakovich 7 6 By Chairman Sainato 7 - 8 7 PRESENTATION 8 By Mr. David Jones 9 - 14 9 QUESTIONS 15 - 34 10 PRESENTATION By Mr. Charles McGarvey 34 - 46 11 QUESTIONS 46 - 73 12 PRESENTATION 13 By Mr. Greg Jakubowski 73 - 87 14 QUESTIONS 87 - 92 15 PRESENTATION By Representative Frank Farry 92 - 104 16 QUESTIONS 105 - 111 17 PRESENTATION 18 By Ed Mann 111 - 127 19 QUESTIONS 127 - 144 20 PRESENTATION By John Bast 144 - 149 21 QUESTIONS 149 - 160 22 23 CLOSING REMARKS By Chairman 160 24 25 SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 4 1 P R O C E E D I N G S ------------------------------------------------------- 2 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Good morning. I'm - I 3 am Representative Steve Barrar, Chairman of the House 4 Veterans Affairs Emergency Preparedness Committee. 5 I will now call this meeting to order. 6 And I would like to ask everyone to please silence 7 their cell phones and devices. 8 I would ask our former retired fire 9 commander, Ed Mann, if he would lead us in the Pledge 10 of Allegiance. 11 --- 12 (WHEREUPON, THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE WAS RECITED.) 13 --- 14 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Good morning, 15 everyone. Thank you for attending today. I would like 16 to ask - first ask the members - we'll start down here 17 on the far right and ask the members to introduce 18 themselves. 19 REPRESENTATIVE O'NEAL: I'm 20 Representative Tim O'Neal, from the 48th District in 21 Washington County. 22 REPRESENTATIVE JAMES: Good morning. My 23 name is Lee James. I come from Venango County, 24 District 64, and also northeast Butler County. 25 REPRESENTATIVE COSTA: Good morning, SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 5 1 guys. Representative Dom Costa, 21st District, 2 Allegheny County. 3 REPRESENTATIVE RYAN: Representative 4 Frank Ryan, 101st District, Lebanon County. 5 SENATOR HUTCHINSON: State Senator Scott 6 Hutchinson, 21st Senatorial District, which is - 7 includes Venango, Clarion, Warren, Forest and a large 8 portion of Butler County. 9 REPRESENTATIVE SACCONE: Rick Saccone, 10 the 39th District, representing southern Allegheny 11 County and northern Washington County. 12 MR. JUMPER: Ron Jumper, Minority 13 Executive Director, Senate of Pennsylvania. 14 MR. SILCOX: Nate Silcox, Senate 15 Veterans Affairs & Emergency Preparedness Committee. 16 SENATOR VULAKOVICH: State Senator Randy 17 Vulakovich, 38th Senatorial District, Allegheny County. 18 MR. O'LEARY: Rick O'Leary, Executive 19 Director. 20 MR. DONATO: Chris Donato. I'm the 21 Democratic Chairman of the Committee for the 9th 22 District. 23 MR. HILLMAN: Mike Hillman, Democratic 24 Executive Director in the House. 25 REPRESENTATIVE BARBIN: Representative SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 6 1 Bryan Barbin, Cambria County. 2 REPRESENTATIVE FARRY: Representative 3 Frank Farry, Bucks County. 4 REPRESENTATIVE HILL-EVANS: 5 Representative Carol Hill-Evans, 95th District, York 6 County. 7 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Is that - okay. 8 Hey, I want to thank everyone for their 9 attendance today. And a special thank you to Fire 10 Commissioner Trego and his staff for once again hosting 11 us here at the Fire Academy. 12 Okay. The SR 6 Commission has been 13 doing some outstanding work over the past few years. I 14 know that various committees have spent countless hours 15 examining their specific issues. Thus, I think our two 16 outstanding legislative committees will be very 17 impressed to hear the fruits of their hard work today. 18 I want to thank the various committee 19 chairs and members for being here today. And I look 20 forward to our discussion as well as the receipt of the 21 final report in a few short months. 22 Okay. Chairman Vulakovich, any 23 comments? 24 We've been joined by Representative 25 Tallman and Senator Dinniman has just walked in also. SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 7 1 Thank you for being here, gentlemen. 2 Chairman? 3 CHAIRMAN VULAKOVICH: Thank you, Mr. 4 Chairman. Pleasure to be here today. We're in Senator 5 Jake Corman's district today. I know he wanted to be 6 here, but he had some business he's got to take care 7 of. So I'm glad to be here. 8 Last week we had a meeting to kind of 9 just get a little idea of what we might expect today 10 between - between everyone. I think a lot of work was 11 done. 12 It looks like we've made a lot of 13 progress. And now we'll try to get this report 14 finalized and then get them to work. So I'm interested 15 in hearing today a little bit more in-depth testimony 16 about each of the committees and what they've come up 17 with. 18 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 19 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Thank you. 20 Chairman Sainato? 21 CHAIRMAN SAINATO: Thank you, Chairman 22 Barrar and Vulakovich. It is an honor to be here once 23 again. 24 We've done this many times in the past. 25 We do thank the Fire Academy for hosting us once again. SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 8 1 And each time we've come we've learned more and more 2 different things about what you do and how you do it. 3 So we thank you for hosting us. 4 We look forward to the testimony today. 5 And this committee, and along with the Senate Committee 6 works very much in a bipartisan manner. Our goal is to 7 make things the best we can for our volunteer and paid 8 firefighters in the state. 9 And the work that you do at the Academy 10 is greatly appreciated. And thank you for everything 11 you guys do in our state - and ladies. Thank you. 12 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Great. 13 Thank you, Chairman Sainato. 14 At this time I would like to call Mr. 15 Tom Cook, Assistant Administrator, State Fire Academy, 16 for some welcoming remarks. 17 You can sit in the hot seat right here, 18 if you want. 19 MR. COOK: Oh, gee, thanks. 20 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: We don't have the 21 ejector button. 22 MR. COOK: Good morning. Welcome to the 23 Fire Academy. Oh, push the button. Okay. How's that? 24 Better? 25 Good morning. I want to welcome SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 9 1 everybody to the State Fire Academy this morning. 2 Commissioner Trego sends his regrets. He's actually 3 out of town at a fire marshals conference, so he's not 4 able to be present with us today. 5 Let us know how we can serve and help 6 the process today here. The staff in the back of the 7 room will bend over backwards to accommodate whatever 8 needs we all come up with, so - all right. 9 What else do you need from me today? 10 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Just Wi-Fi. 11 MR. COOK: Wi-Fi? I'll talk to the IT 12 Department. 13 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: And we're - I think 14 after this, when we conclude the meeting, we're going 15 to get somewhat of a tour and a little bit of a 16 demonstration out back where some of the -. 17 MR. COOK: We currently have the 18 Department of Corrections here doing some training. 19 But anybody that wants a tour afterwards, I'll be more 20 than happy to accommodate them. 21 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Great. Thank you for 22 your hospitality. 23 MR. COOK: Sure thing. Thank you. 24 CHAIRMAN BARRAR: Next I would like to 25 call Emergency Medical Service Subcommittee Chairman SARGENT'S COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. (814) 536-8908 10 1 Mr. Dave Jones, EMS Manager of Penn State University. 2 MR. JONES: Good morning. Thank you. 3 Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony in 4 reference to the work being performed by the EMS 5 Subcommittee. I have provided a list of the committee 6 membership, our meeting dates, data requests made and 7 information received, and a list of draft 8 recommendations in advance of testimony.