paid vs vollies

need some advice on how to get the paid guys to work better with the vollies.here at this dept it seems like the paid guys are running off all the vollies, i have been with this dept for about 20 years and before we went paid we were aleast 50 strong on the vollies, as the years went on and we become an paid dept the vollies seem to be dropping off at an great deal,we are down to about 10 maybe 15 vollies left. can i get some oppions from others on getting the vollies back and working with the paid part of the department????.

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Permalink Reply by Jim Conrad on January 6, 2012 at 2:46pm

first off let me say how much I enjoy being a part of this group! I am a member of a vol. fire dept in a small town with no paid dept. The closest paid dept is about 22 miles away. We have a great working relationship with the paid dept. I am curious as to how many hours a year a paid firefighter will get. our dept has a fairly low minimum number of hours to stay in good standing but some of the members will get from 150-200 hours a year every year because they want to. I am proud to be a part of my dept.

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Permalink Reply by ashfire on January 6, 2012 at 9:08pm

I didn't bring this one up about our county. Since the late 60s we have had a county career service. Before that it was a all volunteer or a set up where volunteer depts hired their own career crews to work during the day. Some of them were volunteers from other volunteer companies in the county.

Now some of the volunteers were career firefighters in career depts or federal depts so they are union members.

Now some of the volunteers that were career firefighters were line officers in their vol dept or leaders in the fire associations but could be just a firefighter or low ranking officer in the career dept.

Now when the career service started in our county you can imagine some of the treatment they got from some of the leaders of some of the volunteer fire companies from union members of another union. This lead to other volunteers following in suit.

This has lead to many years of a grudge of volunteer against career in our county and still happens in some volunteer stations.

I have also known some of the members of our county career service to get their years in and then retire and turn around and join a county volunteer fire company that they had belong to before joining the career side or joining one that they had a good time as part of the crew there. Some of them I have known to become pro volunteer because of what they had seen back then and today. Others use their volunteer membership to keep up with whats happening or to draw a volunteer pension from the years of service as a volunteer before and after they became a career firefighter.

There are some that become volunteer leaders and in some volunteer depts and see a decline in volunteer membership because some of the members didn't meet the leader's ideas of how to run their vol dept or push them to be career firefighters and leave the volunteers service behind. They seem to be a pro career volunteer.

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Permalink Reply by Chad Edward Kinney on January 8, 2012 at 4:17pm

I agree with you on most points.We have a Combination Dept and the Volunteers are so ethusiastic and eager to learn,that on many occassions, the bar has been raised on training.This has caused a change in mentality and has improved everyones outlook.The lack of a solid training regime can be found at many levels, not just Volunteers.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Henderson on January 8, 2012 at 4:35pm

The biggest thing is that both sides have an understanding that they rely on eachother to make the department better and provide the best service to the public. Working together mutually will accomplish that.

I was on a combo fd for a while and it was great. The career staff was well experienced and helped the volunteers as much as they could but they knew they needed us to help the fd provide a better service to the area. I had a blast there and would still be a member if I hadn't moved back to my hometown.

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Permalink Reply by Moose on January 9, 2012 at 2:00pm

Thanks for the tip Brian, and I hope your middle initial isnt "C" like mine is, that would get confusing pretty fast! lol

Stay Safe.

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Permalink Reply by Moose on January 9, 2012 at 2:04pm

And I heard that they are changing around some courses again and increasing the time of the course, I think it was Firefighter I. They are combining "Intro to Officer" and "Fire Officer I" in my state now, making it one class thats 30 hours longer. People wine and groan, but I think its needed. If you want to volunteer yourself to run into IDLH atmospheres I feel you need to train, just like you guys do.

1000 hours, man, thats a ton. I cant even get my crews to train 1000 hours in their CAREERS let alone initially before they fight fires. lol

Stay Safe.

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Permalink Reply by Bulldog324 on January 9, 2012 at 6:47pm

yes jhon i was statoned in may port infact i did retired out of mayport... and i can already see that asking this question was an big mistake for getting peoples oppions on something here that me and others are trying to fix or get resolved so this will be the last post on this question,if i knew it was going to cause such an heart ach towards others i would have never asked for others oppions, sorry if that has stired up such an conflict towards you and others.not mad or anything just think it has stired up alot of crapp that just blew up, hope you have an good night and stay safe out there.

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Permalink Reply by Bulldog324 on January 9, 2012 at 6:48pm

i can already see that asking this question was an big mistake for getting peoples oppions on something here that me and others are trying to fix or get resolved so this will be the last post on this question,if i knew it was going to cause such an heart ach towards others i would have never asked for others oppions, sorry if that has stired up such an conflict towards you and others.hope you have an good night and stay safe out there.