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Should Volunteer Fire Companies Specialize?
Do you thing Volunteer Fire Companies could provide better service to their customers (the community, and mutual aid partners) if each company specialized in one aspect of the fire service?
Much like career departments have Engine companies, Truck companies, Rescue companies, Hazmat units etc...Even though each company is a separate organization would the quality of service be better if each company mastered one aspect of the fire service and then worked together with neighboring companies to server the over all community in their region?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Norm Tindell on
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Like many have said before, small volunteer departments like ours must be able to do it all. The nearest mutual aid company is 15 minutes on a good day. We can handle just about anything that occurs in our town. The main reason is manpower. Every person must be able to do just about everything. I dream of adding more tools and more apparatus, but who's going to operate them?
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Permalink Reply by Mike Moore on
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You may have something here, Rick. This same thought has crossed my mind a time or two. I have read all the responses and though a good many of them have provided a number of sound reasons why it wouldn't work, I applaude your consideration of providing better service to our customers!!! Who knows, we might be looking at a future paradigm shift in the fire service. I believe that each department should encourage its members to learn what strengths and interests they bring to the table and help them master them. If you are doing this, you will improve customer service. Any firefighter that is encouraged to draw from their strengths and rewarded for mastering a particular area is going to provide better service!
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Permalink Reply by Rob on
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Here's a positive spin on specializing.
In my are there are literally hundreds of volunteer departments. The old school boys are too entrenched in the olden days of firefighting and resist company mergers/consolidation. But the huge decline in volunteering is continuing unabated, and combined with low call volumes in small departments, there is very little incentive to attract new members.
In an attempt to increase call volume, one department now offers a specialized service in the area. They offer a dedicated accountability company. Many area departments now call this company on the first alarms for working structure fires where previously they would not have been due. The home company can now use it members for the physical effort and rely on the specialist accountability company for that role.
So what this company did was take an existing fireground role that no one has ever focused on before and virtually create a market for it. Many area companies were more than happy to 'offload' this job onto someone else, with the added benefit that it is now being performed much ,much better.
Another department replaced their second engine with a dedicated air truck for refilling cylinders on scene. This is a specialized service and this company now get called to incidents well outside their previous range.
Specializing can be very effective, but for most departments you need to offer something new or something drastically improved.
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Permalink Reply by 55 TRUCK on
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Rick, tell us more detailes about your Dept. Run load, Run types by percentage, staffing # of Vol & # that make runs. Type and # of Apperatus. Training levels ie certs of FFs. How many stations do you have, type of area you cover,Rural,suburb,industry, combo,any highways or intersates you might respond to on MVAs(Motor Vehicle Accidents)
This information will help us to give you some more detailed models. Based on your Dept.
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The problem with a volunteer department being a Jack-of All-trades is that usually they are a master of none. They may do a couple things real good with a handful of firefightersand usually the same few firefighters do most of the "trades". Rope, Dive, Extrication, FAST, and on and on. Either they are going to burn out or they will never really master it all. We can do some of the things sometimes but not all of the things all the time. There are not enough training hours, manpower and equipment money to properly do it all. I think specializing is absoulutely the way to go. Take three or four mutual aid departments and divi up the jobs. Company A handles all the special case rope rescues, Company B does Hazmat Decon, Company C handles Dive and Water Rescue, etc. Each company can train and equip its individual members to a limited level but when the "experts" are needed, call in your neighbors who are properly equiped and trained to the Master level on an individual tactical evolution. Makes good sense.
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Permalink Reply by Trulen Cates on
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I am on a volunteer department that covers over 200 square miles, over 4000 residence, and several small businesses. Our department is entirely based on donations from our community. We would not (and do not) have the money or the time to specialize in any aspect of the fire service. However we do have persons who paid for, with their own money, and completed training that certified them in Extrication, rope rescue, and EMT. If it was not for them going above what the department required, we would not all know some of the more vital elements. I agree completely with your comment. "They will expect you to do most things "well enough" and keep overall costs down." And for our area that is true. In fire situations we are there to supply water, and personnel, in order to assist the CalFire crews both in our area, and those responding from other areas.
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Permalink Reply by Ted C Hall on
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Here in Western Montana the distances are against that working very well.. We DO use a lot of mutual aid throughout the valley. Our units get called to another district a couple times a month... but waiting for specialized units to get to the northern end of our district could easily take a half hour just from the next district down the highway from here...
Every department from our district south to the Idaho border is volunteer, and there are only two ambulance companies down that way...
The biggest complication we have to getting a specialized crew in is that we have only two north/south routes through the valley, the main highway is a four lane or currently being widened to four lanes, and the alternate route is the "old highway" on the other side of the river...
Some locations that are easily visible from each other require going 10 miles to the nearest river crossing and back to get there...
We do Fire/Rescue/EMS pretty well, and out district is probably less than 20 miles in radius... but it's far enough from the next department we're thinking about adding River Rescue to our menu...
FWIW, it's 9 miles from my house to the Station by road, with less than 7 of that paved... As the crow flies it's less than six miles, I can even see any engines on the apron in front with a spotting scope
The problem is that I've got to drive down to the river, back track south a couple of miles to the nearest bridge, and THEN go in...
On a good day I can make it in in under 20 minutes... that's why we all have radios to coordinate calls on the way to the station, the EMTs carry a basic kit in their POVs and respond directly on medical calls, plus quite a few firefighters carry their bunker gear so they can go direct as well...
We average a call a day year 'round, send firefighters and engines out during wildfire season, and get a LOT of training opportunities through the state and other districts around us...
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Permalink Reply by Ringold15 on
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Frist great post. Second were as you dont see direct specialized fire compainies you have to look closer on some level or anouther there is some. For example I am the swift water crew leader granted we do other stuff as well but no one else does it on our deparment. Also or first due truck is fire attack, search, and starts venting until the tanker arives then whil they are waiting for the tank to be empty( so they can run and fill up) they take over the venting. So once again look closer at the department i would almost promise you they are as specilazed as possible.
once again great post
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Permalink Reply by Jarrett Underwood on
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With the need for fire departments to be all hazard response agencies these days, public responders have a very heavy training schedule, for volunteers this means more time away from there families and work. The idea of volunteer departments specializing is intriguing. If a department could find members that just responded to fire, or rescue, or EMS and all there training was just in that one field they could perhaps increase retention do to less time, having to take a myriad of classes in every imaginable field, giving there members more time for family and work, while also increasing the level of competency of the first responder for the public.
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Permalink Reply by Kathy D'Ambra on
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I brought this up with my chief over 15 years ago. Human nature being what it is, I thought it would be a great idea to channel a person's energy and interests into whatever activities most suited them and made them feel good about the job they are doing. I could never ever do roof work because of lousy balance, but I can do most ground assignments and drive. Others just want to put the wet stuff on the red stuff. Yet others excel at extrication. Why take up their precious volunteer time with tasks and training on stuff they don't want to do or worse yet, can't do?? Volunteer companies that will only take "interior qualified" firefighters are shooting themselves in the foot. Your idea takes this one step further, and I think you are on to something. I think it would keep people's interest--but you would also have to adjust membership qualifications so people can belong to their specialized dept no matter where they happened to live in the area. This sure would save money on apparatus as well...
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Permalink Reply by Betty Jellinek on
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That is a good idea if the departments are located close enough to one another. Our department is in a rural setting, and miles away from neighboring fire depts, so they have to be equipped and prepared for anything.
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