The majority of American firefighters are volunteers. But the number of those volunteers is on a downward trend.
The Lebanon Fire District currently has 36.
“Ten years ago, we had 60 volunteers,” says Lt. Nick Tyler. “Our substations had 10 to 15 volunteers each, and we’ve definitely experienced a loss in volunteers.”
Lebanon has a plan to turn those numbers around. Their goal is to double their volunteers in the next year. Their strategy: more people, doing smaller jobs.
Traditional volunteer firefighters need 60 hours of training a year to be fully certified. Tyler says in today’s world, that’s a big commitment for people to make, hence the drop in numbers.
So, instead of training 60 hours and learning everything, people can train a lot less and join one specific program. This brings in more volunteers and lets firefighters focus on their jobs.
“If we train somebody for five hours a year, put them in a certain role, then free up that guy that trains for 60 hours, then we’re ahead of the curve,” Tyler said.