11/01/2010 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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• WWW,CENTENNIALFIRE.ORG 04 RAP ITEM #5 — Duty 9ffi r Program 7741 LAKE DRIVE LINO LAKES, MN 55014 PHONE 651.784.7472 7- FAX 651.784.2427 In May of 2007 the United States Fire Administration published a document known as FA- 310, Retention and Recruitment for the Volunteer Emergency Services 2007. The document was created at the request of the International Fire Chief Association as they have seen a dramatic decrease in the amount of volunteers that want to give their time to the fire service. Through the research, the document noted that people are still willing to volunteer if: • The experience is rewarding and worth their time. • The training requirements are not excessive. • The time demands are adaptable and manageable. • They are rewarded with a personal sense of value. • There is good leadership minimizing conflict. • There is ample support for the organization. I have been working on all these items by adding an awards program, holding people accountable, requiring training that is challenging and realistic, being more transparent, communicating better, including family events and more. These have all helped increase moral and retained staff that were considering leaving prior to these changes. As I review the data within our reporting system, I am seeing less and less people coming to incidents during the daytime hours, holidays, and weekends. This time is often family time and requires our volunteers to make a decision to either spend time with their family and friends or respond to an incident. In order to change with the times and meet the demands that volunteers are requesting, many local agencies are moving to a "Duty Crew" model of staffing the fire stations. Some Chiefs have used this .model to convince their staff to move to full -time status with the fire department. That' is not niy intent here. I am only looking for ways to offer our volunteers another way to participate in our system and minimize the demands placed upon their families. Today all the firefighters carry a voice pager. When the 911 call comes in, the dispatcher pages the CFD over the pager and IF the firefighter can respond to the call, he or she will go to their assigned station, wait for others, and respond to the scene. In order to be in good standing with the fire district, each firefighter has to make 25% of all the calls for their assigned station. They do not however, know when those calls will come. It may be during their work hours, at Christmas dinner or their kid's championship soccer game. I would Iike to move to staffing model that allows me to schedule them at the fire station for a minimum of 4 hours at a time during selected holidays (to start) and then weekends. I