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Shane Ray's "Rethinking Volunteer Firefighter Certification" article will make some waves...
The new superintendant of the South Carolina Fire Academy asks some tough question and offers some creative solutions to the problem of volunteer firefighter certification and just what that should mean.
Here's the article: http://www.firefighternation.com/article/training-0/rethinking-volu...
It is thought-provoking, to say the least. What do you guys think?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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I'm not seeing the merger route, I'm seeing the attempt to maintain a fifedom. This isn't about the poverty issue that you have mentioned before, the area is growing as mentioned, not typically the results of an impoverished area. The dept is not affiliated with a political entity or controlled by a city or township, thus appearing to be a private entity. We see a mention of other depts covering the same area as this particular dept, which shows the said townships etc have subsequent coverage. We see a mention that the townships are stubborn and won't "up" the contracts, which in itself becomes a question as to why not. Are they not satisfied with the service? Are they refusing to accept the increase of operating expense due to increased calls? Are they getting more and better services from the other depts? Are they playing the game like Obion County?
The point is that this particular example doesn't really fit within the context of this discussion, there are too many variables that are not accounted for. Sure they may have a funding issue, but there are also several unanswered questions which can factor into their issue as well. Again, this isn't a dept tied to a community as their only resource and service (per the OP's words). I'm not even questioning their dedication, because that in itself can be another issue that we just don't know anything further to even speculate.
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Permalink Reply by Don Catenacci on
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Bobby,
Sometines I think you are just a bull headed moron. Pay attention this time okay.
My comment about what you said had absolutely nothing to do with exterior, interior, support, rehab, hang out at the fire station, cook, or anything thing else. It simply is agreeing with your statement that no one has to join the fire department if they don't want to. That is the truth and I agree with it 100%. The corrolary is just as basic and true, If you don't want to do the job the way it is supposed to be done then don't join.
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Ben,
Nice try to divert this to a personal attack on me.
Let me tell you a little story about my #1 POC FD. When I joined in 1977 we had a 1937 Ford pumper, a 1950 Ford pumper, and a 1949 Mack converted fuel tanker for our tender. We had 2 SCBA, rubber coats, and MSA plastic fire helmets like they wore on emergency. We had minimal hand tools like axes and pike poles. We had no generators and lights, no power saws, no extrication equipment, and a good portion of our hose was vintage 1947 to mid 60's.
Wedidn;t sit and cry about our situation and say nothing could be done We went to our board and petitioned them for more money. Our equipment budgelsot was $500. We also aggressively fund raised and bought hose and tools with that money. We slowly got them to come around and raise our equipment budget. First priority was PPE and SCBA. We started with 2 or 3 sets of gear a year until everyone had new coats and boots. We also added more SCBA. Yes it was a slow process but we kept moving forward. We purchased a variety of used apparatus over the years until we got a grant in 2005 to buy a pumper that we paid the matching funds for our of our fundraiser money. We acquired power saws, extrication equipment, generators, more specialized tools, LDH, 2 inch attack hose, better nozzles, and multi gas monitors as time went on. In 2003 we received a grat for SCBA that allowed us to replace all of our SCBAs, get a compressor, and add more hose. We sold our obsolete brush truck and ourchased a 5/4 pick up truck through government surplus and outfitted that as our brush truck. Just recently in a 50/50 deal the village paid half and we paid half to purchase a newer used engine to replace our 1975 Mack engine.
It has taken us 35 years to get where we are but we never quit, we never accpeted that status quo was adequate, we nev er compromised on trying to get the latest and greatest in PPE for our firefighters. There is money out there if people have the gumption to go after it. Federal Grants and Loans, State Grants and Loans, Private Organizations that offer Grants to fire departments, businesses that offer Grants both locally and nationally, some insurance companies offer grants, and some private citizens offer grants for their local FDs. You have to do the work though, you can't sit back and wait for them to come to you.
There is a huge difference between hanging in their and accepting essentially defeat and continuing to struggle with obsolete junk, essentially saying we can do nothing to improve our circumstances, and doing the leg work and putting in the time to find alternative funding. We didn't walk away, but we also didn't accept that we must operate with junk because that is how it always was. The futility of never moving forward and accepting that as good enough is in no way outstanding in anyway.
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Oh boy, lot's of typos in my post above. But because of the time limit thing I can't go back and fix them.
If anyone needs clarificaion just ask.
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Permalink Reply by Bob Callahan on
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I don't think anyone is talking about giving up. At least no department in the worse-case situations that I have described in my area are, but that being said, the reality is that right now they operate under some pretty severe funding, resource and manpower restrictions and limitations that, just for the sake of firefighter safety, force them to be an exterior department the majority of the time.
When the fire conditions, interior-qualified manpower, response time and resources permit them to go interior, they do. But this many times in many rural VFDs in this area is the exception and not the rule.
Based on your posts, you would consider them a lesser department because of this reality, as well as the use of exterior-only personnel as a significant component of their department. If that is how you judge a fire department, so be it. It's the job of the fire department to respond with the level of resources, including manpower, exterior and interior, and do what they are able given thier situation. The sad truth is there will always be fire departments that can't make an interior attack at any time, and another group that will only have the resources to make interior attacks, and rescues, in very limited circumstances.
Community size, community wealth, non-residental tax base, and yes, the communities dedication to prroviding both funding and volunteer manpower all play a role in the deparrtment's ability to deliver service. Unfortuantly, the department has no control over some of these factors and very limited control over one or two. Try as they will, there are places where the obstacles simply can't be overcome, and the department must operate within the limits of the hand they have been dealt and in many cases that means a department with primarily exterior personnel that operates primarily exterior.
And because of that I strongly support a certification option for those members. It really doesn't matter to me if the department allows it to remain as an option, or if they choose to make it mandatory for their members. However, I do oppose it being enacted as a mandatory certification by the state. I see the purpose of this as giving memebers the option of developing thier professionalism. I don't see it as a hammeer to be used by the state to force departments into mandatory training levels.
That is all
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Bobby,
Nice job entirely passing over my comments on altrernative funding. But then again that takes EFFORT, not just sitting by and wringing your hands and moaning about how tough things are. The funny thing with grants is if you don't apply for them you never receive them. It may take several attempts to be successful, it did for us when we tried for an engine.
But then again, like almost all the rest of your arguments they are more about excuses, and why you can't move forward, than anything else. My #1 POC FD could still be driving a1937 Ford engine, a 1950 Ford engine, and a 1949 Mack Tanker, if we had surrendered and said "woe is me, nothing can be done." But we didn't we got aggresive with asking for better funding, doing fund raisers, and seeking alternative sources of funding like grants. Something EVERY volly or POC FD can do...IF they are serious about being firefighters and having a fire department.
Let's be frank, shall we Bobby? You don't give a tinker's damn about certification of any kind. Why? Because it takes away YOUR local control. If you seriously believed in it you would go all out to get your exterior firefighter as a mandatory standard, complete with certification, for your exterior guys. But even YOU champion of the outstanding firefighter won't support that. You sir are a hypocrite and a joke.
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Bobby,
Nice job entirely passing over my comments on altrernative funding. But then again that takes EFFORT, not just sitting by and wringing your hands and moaning about how tough things are. The funny thing with grants is if you don't apply for them you never receive them. It may take several attempts to be successful, it did for us when we tried for an engine.
But then again, like almost all the rest of your arguments they are more about excuses, and why you can't move forward, than anything else. My #1 POC FD could still be driving a1937 Ford engine, a 1950 Ford engine, and a 1949 Mack Tanker, if we had surrendered and said "woe is me, nothing can be done." But we didn't we got aggresive with asking for better funding, doing fund raisers, and seeking alternative sources of funding like grants. Something EVERY volly or POC FD can do...IF they are serious about being firefighters and having a fire department.
Let's be frank, shall we Bobby? You don;t give a tinker's damn about certification of any kind. Why> Because it takes away YOUR local control. If you seriously believed in it you would go all out to get your exterior firefighter as a mandatory standard, complete with certification, for you exterior guys. But even YOU champion of the outstanding firefighter won't support that. You sir are a hypocrite and a joke.
Never said they should not pursue grants and other funding options, but for many of these departments even coming up with matching funds could be an issue.
I know that many of these departments have been seeking grants, and some have been getting them, so yes, they should apply. I never stated otherwise, did I?
And most of these departments also do fundraisers.
But that still doesn't change the fact that the tax base simply does not exist for them to pull funding from. And that's not changing. In fact, in many of these communities the commercial/industrial base is actually shrinking. Bottom line the funding levels are not changing. That's not an excuse or "woe is me", but that is the simple reality.
As far as certification, yes, you are right in part that turning the direction of your training over to a certification-based route is giving up local control. It's doing nothing but allowing the cirriculum to teach your members the skills they may not need in your district, and forcing you to either lenghten the basic course to teach those skills or teach them at a later time, neither of which is a good option.
You are right. I don't want to lose control of what I train my new members to do in my fire department using my equipment in my buildings. I never said do not incorporate the relevant parts of FFI into your training program, as yes, it is an excellent blueprint for department-level training. But I do say, and likely always will, teach, train and test them intially what they need to know to operate as a member of your fire department, then after they master that, teach them general knowledge and the alternatives, if time permits.
LA is about to make every school district teach a standard statewide/national cirriculum with basically no local input. I don't see that as a good thing.
Again, I'll repeat that I fully support optional certifcation of personnel to whatever level they choose once they have completed an in-house basic firefighting course covering local operations. If the department feels that FFI meets that need as thier basic training program, fine, but it is a choice that should be made by the department that they have made weighing the pros and cons of FFI, not mandated by the state. That even includes requiring specific certfications for promotion as aiming for promotion within the department is a choice by the member to attempt to obtain additional responsibility.
Call me a hypercroite if you want. I guess it's my feeling that every department has the potential, and I would even argue the right to develop it's own outstanding in-house rookie training that may meet local and deprtment needs even better than a canned FFI cirriculum. I guess I see what departments are capable of of when they are not led by the nose by the nanny state.
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The sad fact is you NEVER mentioned seeking grants, you talked about tax base, and lack of LOCAL funding. Have you applied for or even seen an AFG grant application lately? Guess what they ask you on that application...They ask about how many members of your FD are FF1 and FF2. Then they ask about an implementation plan to get the rest of your firefighters to that level. So your blatant refusal to support that, in your combo, or volly FD is HURTING them in the AFG grant arena. BRILLIANT!! Hold them dowwn even more by eliminating or severely hanicapping the opportunity for grants. But that is the price you pay by holding on to little kingdoms in the fire service.
By the way, NO ONE here has said you can't teach your firefighters specific skills for your area. What many of us have been saying is if your firefighters meet a recognized minimum standard when they go on a mutual aid call the minimum skill set is the same for all firefighters on the scene. You don't have an engine arriving with people that can't go interior, can't ladder, can't wear scba, and so on. If you want to run exterior firefighters I certainly hope you inform mutual aid companies of the fact that the engine they requested might not have any interior firefighhters onboard. Because frankly in this area if you responded with an engine full of guys that couldn't go in you would probably be sent home.
You are a hypocrite Bobby, and the worst kind of one since you are supposedly an educator and an overzhealous safety freak. Train people to a minimum standard and then add the locally specific training. I whole heartedly support stricter training standards for the entire fire service and all guys like you do is get in the way of actually making the volunteer/POC fire service a professional entity. You love to talk about tradition and failure to move forward, you know 200 years of tradition unimpeded by progress...yet here you are doing nothing of any substance to break the tradition that vollies are a bunch of good old boys that show up and water down the remains because, lord knows, we can't expect anything more out of them because their lives are busy. NONSENSE, and the truly pathetic part is even you know it is nonsense.
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Nice personal attack again .....
The bottom line is in these areas, no rural VFD meets your idea of a "recognized minimum standard". Sure, there are a few to some members that do depending on the department, but overall, no. And they all know what all the other departments that they run mutual aid with can and can't do, and they all know what the other departments bring to the table when they are requested for mutual aid. They know they are likely to get a mix of interior and exterior members, or depending on the department, they may get primarily or all exterior members, and I can assure you that in these rural areas, such as served by my VFD, nobody that responds will be sent home.
As far as doing hothing of substance, within the last 6 months I was the lead instructor on a 1403 class at my VFD, developed a rookie class at my VFD, taught an Awareness and Operations class at my VFD, am in the process of implementing a new fire attack SOP at my VFD and I am currently assisting in teaching a FFI class, off the clock, at my combo department. I am also scheduled to teach a truck fire class at 2 MA departments in the nextt 2 months and a Rapid Intervention class after that for afew departments on the north end of my volunteer district..
That being said, I am intelligent enough to know that there is and always will be a significant difference in capabilities between my combo and volunteer departments for a number of factors, including 8x the manpower and almost 7x the budget. Would I love my volunteer department to have the same capabilities as my combo department? Sure I would, but that simply ain't going to happen. And would I love some of the mutual aid departments to my VFD have greater interior capabilities? Yup, but I understand the handicaps they operate under. Is that being defeatistic? Maybe, but it's also being realistic in evaluating the resources that we have at hand, both internally and externally.
I have never supported the idea that vollies should be just a bunch of good old boys, but there are places that are going to have limited resources ans minimum capabilities. That is always going to be the reality.
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You can call it an attack if you wish, but the facts are YOU are a hypocrite. You strongly advocated for a National Standard an certification for your beloved Exterior Firefighters, and then, here comes the hypocrisy and you can't even deny it, you want it all to be voluntary. I even said okay, I will support your Exterior certification if you would support FF1 as a minimum for Interior firefighters. That is when your whole tune changed and you wanted that standard and certification to all be optional and voluntary. What's the matter Bobby? Did someone out think what you thought was a sweet deal and then you were like "OH SHIT! I can't support that."
You say you never have supported that vollies should be just a bunch of good old boys, but then go on to say "That is always going to be reality." So which is it? you don't support good old boy basement savers or you do by its inevitability? The only reason these scenarios are reality is because people like you believe it is. My #1 POC FD didn't believe that hogwash, we worked for decades to get where we are. We never said all we are is all we will ever be...talk about defeatist.
As for all the classes you teach...good for you. Do you go into those stations and teach the curriculum or teach that since they don't have any equipment you will never be able to do any of this? You bad mouthed haz mat ops in another post yet here you are saying you are teaching it...WHY?
I have been busy teaching courses for the tech college, as well as designing and running training for both of my POC FDs, building training props, coordinating with other firefighters on props they have built, and taking courses myself, such as a Train the Trainer for Safety Officer. The difference is I believe teaching is an opportunity to open the world of firefighting, different ideas, techniques, tactics, and equipment to students. Not just regurgitate the same stuff they hear over and over from their training officer and guys on their local FD. If that was what I was supposed to do they don't need me and the resources I have.
You make this whole thing sound like the old "State's Rights" arguments of the civil rights era. Seriously if you desire to be called professional then it takes more than just showing up. If you want federal money they are now looking at local training and certifications. The lack of those will continue the downward spiral of those "Good Old Boys" vollie FDs.
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Permalink Reply by Ben Waller on
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Don, that was indeed a personal attack, it is a violation of the FFN user agreement, and it needs to stop right now.
If it occurs again, you will be reported to the administrators.
Be civil, or be gone.
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