OK, you were downtown. I was with Clear Lake for eight years. It was right at the time when Houston was fighting their incorporation in court. When it was finally settled in Houston's favor, they brought in 72's. The snag they hit was in sufficient equipment for a box alarm. They were planning on backup from JSC and found out it was wrong. The equipment at JSC wasn't allowed to leave the premises.
There was a big battle when HFD wanted to contract with Clear Lake to be the second-in engine. The union raised hell because we were part paid, part volunteer and not union members. With all the stink they raised about "professional" firefighters, I finally pulled out our records and showed where the average FF on our department had over 15 years experience and six were currently paid on other departments. Forty percent of our department was rated "Advanced Firefighter" by state standards and five were state certified instructors teaching at A&M. We asked the judge if the union was using the word "professional" in place of "union member" and, if so, the case should be found in our favor. The city wanted it and the union didn't so an agreement was reached whereby we would open a second bank account for those funds from the contract and none of it would be used for salaries.
The only problem we had after that was an attitude problem from one of 72's Captains. He was the only one that had nothing but derogatory statements about our department and felt that, even if we were first on scene and our chief had set up command, he was IC as soon as he showed up and didn't any input from us as to what had happened up to that point. His countermanding existing orders did, in fact, lead to some serious problems that sometimes led to safety violations. We complained, he was reprimanded, we complained again and he was transferred.
I never heard of EO...what is it? When I left, they had just started the Master Firefighter program.