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To pay or not to pay
I am writing a paper for a course I am taking. The subject or thesis statement is “a full-time, paid fire chief to administer York’s two fire departments is overdue.” I have the paper outlined and started writing, but I don’t want to overlook something. I assume there are many fire departments facing the issue of staying with a volunteer chief or go to a paid chief, or the other way. What are some of the reasons.
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we pay our cheif to ensure that he does his job. as a vol. rescue squad members show up when they want but the cheif has to be there and has to take care of his dutys at the station. -
We have gone both ways acutally.
We started years ago as a total volunteer department.
Then about 5 years ago, they decided that they wanted a paid chief.
They went through 2 in about 4 years. The pay that we could offer was not enough for the chiefs to make a living to support thier respective families. My current Captain was the second paid Chief that we had. He finally had to give it up to support his wife and 3 children.
We are now back to a volunteer Chief.
The pros and cons are obvious.
A paid chief has the opportunity to take care of pre-plans and investigations and so forth. He is also there 9-5 M-F to care for burn permits and ensure that they are not mis-handled and so forth, plus many other paperwork duties.
The Con in our case is that our budget was not enough to handle a family man. A single man maybe would be a consideration, but, even though we technically STILL have the money in the budget, it does not seem that for the amount of calls we run per year (avg 120-140) that a paid Chief is prudent at this juncture in our life as a department.
Just a couple of thoughts from a brother in Nebraska.
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Your Brother In The Service,
Rob Herpel
FF/EMT
Vice-Pres./Asst. EMS Coordinator
Fremont Rural Fire DepartmentComment
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