Tell me about the Sacramento area? (any area firefighters here?)

[StreetDoctor]

Average temperature, diving options, etc etc. I'm thinking about trying to do a lateral transfer to the Sacramento FD. I'd love to get away from the midwest and chicago winters!

 

[jumsted65]

There's not much diving in Sacramento proper. There are a couple diveable lakes, but nothing worthwhile. You can drive a short distance up the hill to some Sierra Nevada lakes, if you're into lake diving, but I find it mostly boring. Lake Tahoe is a good once-in-a-while dive. That's about 2 hours from Sac.

The good diving 'round here is Monterey. That's a 3+ hour drive from Sacramento.

Weather: It doesn't snow, which is good. Winters tend to be gloomy, foggy, overcast, with temps dipping below freezing at night on occasion. Summers are hot, high 90's to low 100's, with a few days over 110.

I'm about 90 miles south of Sacramento. Lots of crime and crystal meth, crappy air quality, too much traffic, but all-in-all, not too bad a place to live. Good luck

 

[FishDiver]

There's not much diving in Sacramento proper.

Weather: It doesn't snow, which is good. Winters tend to be gloomy, foggy, overcast, with temps dipping below freezing at night on occasion. Summers are hot, high 90's to low 100's, with a few days over 110.

I'm about 90 miles south of Sacramento. Lots of crime and crystal meth, crappy air quality, too much traffic, but all-in-all, not too bad a place to live. Good luck

I won't argue with the diving overview. The lifestyle assessment is a little negative. It may reflect Modesto better than Sacto. Winters are stormy but there are many sunny days between storms and the daytime temps are rarely below 50F. Summers are hot but very dry. Within a drive of 2-3 hours you can visit the coast, explore the Sierras, or visit several different wine regions.

I am moving back in January. Hope to dive with you.

 

[jumsted65]

Yeah, I just read the local news. Perhaps I was a little negative. Sacramento is nicer than Modesto, though more crowded and with worse air quality.

Just keepin' it real

 

[Anti-Hero]

I love Sacramento. I just wish it was closer to Monterey.

I'm not a FF, but I do work with them on a regular basis as a PSD.

I don't know about lateral transfers here, and there is a HUGE pool of freshly minted EMT's, CC Academy graduates, etc. waiting to be picked up by a department. I'd look at Metro, and County and find out what their lateral policies are.

The nice thing about Sacramento is the outlying cities / counties which may have different hiring needs. Placer County, Elk Grove, Sacramento City / County / Yolo County / El Dorado county, Folsom Fire, Roseville Fire, etc. Just to name a few.

 

[Teamcasa]

I love Sacramento.

The nice thing about Sacramento is the outlying cities / counties which may have different hiring needs. Placer County, Elk Grove, Sacramento City / County / Yolo County / El Dorado county, Folsom Fire, Roseville Fire, etc. Just to name a few.

My daughter and her family live in Folsom. It is a real nice, family oriented city. Weather is pretty good but the diving (as stated by others) is a drive. Monterey or Tahoe. I’m driving up to visit them tomorrow!

 

[cmburch]

I was in Sacramento today. Clean air and warm. The smog probably blows towards Modesto. I must have missed the traffic. I parked around 8am and left around 4pm. The pay is probably better for firemen closer to San Francisco. Close to skiing and backpacking, the Sierras and Reno. About a 3 hr drive to Sonoma for diving and abalone. Nice waterways for watersports. Affordable housing. Nice college campus. I have never been there in the evening, but I suspect it has a pretty good night life like SF and LA. Pretty good airport SMF with some of the best travel deals for many locations. A lot of wildlife because of the water and marshes.

 

[StreetDoctor]

sounds good, we're probably going to visit in june. Sacramento is one of the few departments that do lateral transfers. It amazes me that more departments don't do it, it'd save a ton of money. I'd actually prefer the crime rates, drugs, etc. (Means more fires to fight for me as bad as that sounds ) When I visit I'll look into residency requirements, etc. If I remember correctly I believe the pay was decent.

 

[alibi 2]

If I was doing a lateral transfer, I'd look at the large city departments of either San Jose FD or Santa Clara FD...there are lots of smaller agencies in the area to look at too...you'd be in the bay area and only about a 1 hour drive to the ocean or 45 min. to San Francisco..In the north you have San Francisco FD and Santa Rosa..

 

[cmburch]

The SF Bay Area has better pay, but the housing costs are much greater. Essentially the pay tends to be higher closer to SF and the price of housing also tends to be much greater.

The weather in Santa Clara County is better, less extremes, more consistent than Sacramento because of the SF Bay water. The smog in the summer is probably the worst in Northern California because the wind is channeled from all SF Bay cities to the South Bay between the coastal Santa Cruz range and inland hills/mts. The wind has a cooling effect in the evening coming from the Bay to the warm land during the summer. Crime has drop drastically over the past 20 years in Santa Clara County, but traffic has done just the opposite and only gets worse. Santa Cruz is 1/2 hr for beaches and good fishing. Monterey 1.25 hr. SF is 50 mi away. 3 excellent airports SJC, SFO, and OAK. Many schools available, UCSC, UCB, UCSF, Stanford, Hayward State, SF State, SJ State, Santa Clara University.

You know better than I that it depends on the station. Some LA County stations can be getting calls for the entire shift. While others only get a few. I assume the same may be true for Sacramento. The downtown stations may be running more often versus the outlying suburbs.

I think many SF civil service jobs may require residency in SF.