Bill You havent heard yet?.........SKYCRANE is coming we dont need apppliances!
Seriously though, the organisation is in for a very rocky next 5 years or so, with some brigades now unrecognisable from when they were established, either with the poulation moving away, due to farming practices and economy or with areas being populated and becoming another suburb of Adelaide, some HARD decisions are coming and "rationalisation" will be the death knell to the way some brigades have previously operated.
Rationalisation will allow state to move appliances current or due, to areas whos SEFC have changed, the current economy downturn WILL have implications as to our funding, as will the aging/changing demographic of volunteers!
The current replacement program is not even meeting the 5% of appliances a year it needs to keep up with it 20 year replacement vision, so the lower callout brigades realistcaly should have trucks that runout to 25years before replacement and with the more active brigades 50 callout a year?, definately keeping the 20 year replacement program up.
The movement of appliances in a 7, 7 & 6 year cycle should be revisited properly, this would keep the newest appliances were they are needed most!
The future in my opinion reads "strike teams", with more areas being left with a defensive capability, until strike teams can supplement their ability to an aggresive one for the duration of the incident.