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Public Safety Firefighting VS. Private Sector Fire Fighting
Out of interest, why do many people seem to pursue the public sector for their fire fighting careers and not the private sector?
There are many private industrial companies (Such as heavy manufacturing, automotive, mining, steel, etc) that employ full time Emergency Response Teams (ERT's) and yet the private sector often fails to attract even half decent candidates.
Is it because often the private sector require a full range of competencies and qualifications before commencing employment where as many public sector employers (Her in Oz at least) will train you up when you commence?
I know of one company that is looking to pay in the vicinity of $74,000 pa to ERT members. They work 2 day, 2 nights, 4 off. That's good money for doing what you love doing.
Thoughts?
There are many private industrial companies (Such as heavy manufacturing, automotive, mining, steel, etc) that employ full time Emergency Response Teams (ERT's) and yet the private sector often fails to attract even half decent candidates.
Is it because often the private sector require a full range of competencies and qualifications before commencing employment where as many public sector employers (Her in Oz at least) will train you up when you commence?
I know of one company that is looking to pay in the vicinity of $74,000 pa to ERT members. They work 2 day, 2 nights, 4 off. That's good money for doing what you love doing.
Thoughts?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by lutan1 on
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I shoudl also add, if the lifestyle attracts the applicant, there's loads if mines jobs over here where mines rescue teams are on a FIFO roster and are earning well over $110,000 pa for both above ground and underground.
There's no doubt that this is specialised but I reckon the variety they see in jobs would be just as much as the public sector counter-parts. Many mine sites over here also provide first response coverage for the towns in the area as well, so it's often not just a mine site you're looking after....
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Ironically, I've just done a bit of surfing and actually found that the job numbers in mining (For ERT's, paramedics, etc) are way down on what they were recent months. I wonder if it's the economic down turn????
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Permalink Reply by Chris Gaylord on
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I think it's mostly a perception thing. A lot of potential FFs don't see an industrial ERT as being as glamorous as working on a municipal department, much like they don't see wildland-only firefighting or working for a small city as being as glamorous as working for a big city. Also, I think the retirement is generally better in municipal departments...most private sector companies aren't offering pensions anymore, whereas here in CA in most municipal FDs, you can retire at 50 with 3% of your top salary per year of service. If you start in around 20, that means you're close to full salary for your pension by the time you hit 50. It's hard for a 401(k) to compete with that, especially with economic downturns like the one we're in right now.
The department I work for is something of a mix between a municipal department and an industrial one...the campus FD at the University of California Santa Cruz. We're a unit of the campus, much the same as Dining Services or any other service unit. But, we're a full career FD, represented by IAFF, and we respond into the city of Santa Cruz on confirmed structure fires, wildland fires and even some auto accidents. We also respond state-wide for major wildland incidents. Other than the fact that we get our paycheck from the University, we're really not much different from a small city FD. But, we also do know our campus much better than a lot of FDs know their first-in areas. We inspect every building on campus, we require our FFs to learn every building (target hazards don't really apply for us...everything's a target hazard), and at the admin level, we attend a lot of campus meetings and events that a municipal FD wouldn't be involved with.
Our jurisdiction and call volume are similar to small cities. We have about 2,000 acres of land we protect (half of which is undeveloped forest and grassland), a daytime population of 19,000 and a nighttime population of over 9,000 and a call volume of about 700 calls/year. During the day, we're the third largest "city" in the county: Santa Cruz proper has a population of 55,000, Watsonville has a bit over 40,000 and Scotts Valley is down to 11,000.
We do get some of that same "glamor" problem. We have a relatively high turnover rate, especially amongst FFs, because they go to work for "big city" departments where they have more calls, more OT availability, more stations to bid, etc. The guys who stick it out though do so because they enjoy it. Our pay is generally a bit lower than surrounding departments (we just got it up close to par recently..before that, it was way lower), but our benefits are really good.
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Thanks Chris for the repsponse- what's the approximate breakdown of your call stats? (Fire vs. Hazmat. vs MEdical ,etc)
Interesting stats you give- I had a friend over here who was the Emergency Management Coordinator for one of the big universities in Melbourne and I was astounded to know their population on any given day was up around the 50,000! It's as big as (if not bigger) than many towns being protected by other FD's.
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It's pretty comparable to your "average" municipal department. Probably 60% or more EMS..the only difference is that we have a lot more 19-24 year olds in our population. So, we get a lot of alcohol related incidents, some drugs. Lots of traumas from bike accidents, skateboarding (which isn't allowed on campus, but doesn't stop them), a couple vehicle accidents a year. On top of that, the normal medical conditions that you'll find in any population. About the only thing we don't do much are "geriatric" calls since our population age tends to top out at the early 60s.
HazMats are relatively rare. We get some minor spills in the labs, but not as many as you'd expect and the people working in the labs are trained to deal with the minor stuff. We did, however, have a couple of full-blown lab fires back before my time which resulted in the county HazMat team responding and doing a full decon setup. Three of our personnel are on the team (two Techs and one Spec) and we also have two guys from our Environmental Health & Safety department who are on the team as technical advisers.
Fires are a mix. Fair number of accidental alarm activations, some intentionals. We've had a few structure fires, mostly room and contents, but some larger, more involved ones. Car fires, dumpster fires, grass fires. We also go off-campus into the city probably on average once a month for mutual aid fires, both structure and wildland.
Oh, and we're one of the smallest of the 10 UC campuses in terms of population....UCLA has a daytime population over 66,000. Only two of the campuses have FDs though: UC Davis and us. All the others have a fire prevention department, and a couple have EMS response, but we're the only two with full FDs (we're also both represented by the same IAFF Local).
There's some more info on our department webpage at http://fire.ucsc.edu/ if you're interested.
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Permalink Reply by T.Jae' on
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Thanks for the info on the private sector. Would you mind sharing some more on it and what's the name of the company you're referring to? Thanks
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Permalink Reply by Bill on
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Henderson Fire Dept. in Nevada(borders Las Vegas) is hiring Firefighter/Paramedics Great benefits, salary, retirement, and equipment.
www.hfdcareers.com and www.cityofhenderson.com www.hendersonfireonline.com
Please pass it along!
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Check out Chris's profile- it has his details
http://www.firefighternation.com/profile/ChrisGaylord
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Permalink Reply by Robert Stewart on
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I'd love to become a private sector fire fighter but due to the fact many if not all private sector ff jobs require you to have RCR,HAZMAT,CABA, Confined Rescue, Industrial First Aid and HR licence that explains the lack of people interested in that kinda job within the private sector cause its so hard if you dont have those kind of qualifications
Now if the private sector such as the ones you have listed above werent so stringent on people having these qualifications and say only asked for fire fighters who have got experience in fire fighting and fire prevention without all the fancy qualifications and training there would be alot more people wanting a private sector fire fighting job
Literally i dont see the need for qualifications such as Confined Rescue,Hazmat and RCR cause nine times out of ten if an incident like that happened on a mining or steel site or in a automotive factory the Emergency Response Team would simply respond and cordon off the scene and coordinate evacuation leaving the Hazmat or RCR to the local fire service that has the special training and equipment
Unless the employers can offer a certificate in Public Safety (Fire & Rescue Operations) and allow them to study this certificate as well as gaining each qualification at the same time as they go along i might conside private sector fire fighting as a career
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Permalink Reply by John on
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Hard to say but I am betting you are right that they need special training to deal with the different types of equipment, and minerals ETC.
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Literally i dont see the need for qualifications such as Confined Rescue,Hazmat and RCR cause nine times out of ten if an incident like that happened on a mining or steel site or in a automotive factory the Emergency Response Team would simply respond and cordon off the scene and coordinate evacuation leaving the Hazmat or RCR to the local fire service that has the special training and equipment
I have one client that puts their ERT members through the Cert II and they have the most amazing equipment and response capabilities!
They have 2 pumpers, a rescue and LOADS of equipment.
They handle all HAZMAT's (With very few ever being passed along to the CFA), they could easily have compelted a confined space or rope resuce way before the CFA or SES ever got on site, etc.
Don't under estimate them- there's some kick arse teams around...!
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Permalink Reply by Robert Owens on
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I would say it has to do with a majority of things.....
The public sector to me offers more challange, more opportunity for advancement, and an oppourtunity to help more people. I work in a lower class area and we are everything to those people they don't go to the doctor they call the FD, they don't call the plumber they call the FD etc.
Plus this is also a personal belief I don't think you should make any decisions becuase of money.....is money nice and neccessary to live absolutley.....but it should not be the reason you choose to do or not do something....once you are controlled by money then you can never go back. I prefer to be satsified with the challange of my job and anything other than that is a bounus all I need is enough money to cover the bills.
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