Next year is all about adding people to help with Clallam County Fire District 3’s increasing call load.
Leaders with the Sequim area fire department look to add four more line staff in 2020 bringing the total of firefighters/EMTs or paramedics from 34 at the start of 2019 to 39 next year.
Fire commissioners authorized two new firefighters, with one hired so far and another three anticipated to be hired in 2020, District 3 Fire Chief Ben Andrews said.
“We’re a service industry, so we’re going to add as many people as the budget allows,” he said.
Fire district leaders are establishing a hiring list now for tentative interviews in the first quarter of 2020 for the four additional firefighters, Andrews said.
Volunteer firefighters are looked at first for potential employment, he said, before opening hiring to the outside.