I'm sorry, but did the word volunteer change while I was asleep?
I’m not as a rule this blunt but NoGrayZone, you must be a different kind of stupid. Volunteer firefighters simply means the labor is provided by unpaid firefighters. They still have to have the several millions of dollars of shinny red stuff and 100s of hours of training and a place to house all their stuff. Someone has to pay for this.
You know stupid, not sure about this fire but the one in 2010 involving this same fire dept., the trailer was actually in a different state than the fire dept. Question? Do you pay local taxes for out of state services? No one does. Maybe you should learn something about fire districts and the costs of running a fire department.
I’m a volunteer fire fighter in PA. I don’t get one cent for my efforts although I have all kinds of state and national certifications and a ton of training. I’m also a volunteer EMT. Last January, while on a volunteer ambulance call, I slipped on the ice and broke my left tibia and fibula. I now have a plate, seven screws and a pin in my left lower leg.
Question? Who do you think paid for all that medical and loss of work from my regular job and all the therapy?
Answer: Although I’m a volunteer, the township (or fire district) by law maintains workmans comp insurance for volunteeers. Fire fighting is very dangerous. One of my fellow firefighters fell through the foor of a trailer and has an almost identical tib/fib fracture with internal fixation as mine. If my fire district did not maintain the insurance via tax payer funding we would both be basically screwed.
We cannot train with the state fire academy or through the BCCC without being a member of a fire company and infact we just submitted paperwork to Harrisburg to get water rescue certified and they insisted on knowing who our workmans comp provider is and the policy number before processing our volunteer labor water rescue team application.
The local government is responsible for providing fire protection. The problem is that the unincorporated area where this fire happened does not provide fire protection. They could contract it to a willing fire company or organize their own but they haven’t done so. The awful out-of-county fire dept out of the goodness of their heart offers a subscription service to those who want it. Those who don’t take advantage of it are SOL if their place catches fire. It is really just that simple.
Imagine how you would feel if you lived in the city, pay a fire tax to the dept that offers a subscription service to the rural out-area and your place catches fire. You dial 911 but no response because your tax funded fire dept is out in east bum fu** putting our mrs. too cheap to pay $75.00 per year to protect her single wide and can’t get to your fire for at least 2 hours. Or your 17 year old daughter get’s T-Boned by some hippy in a Dodge Powerwagon and the fire dept can’t cut her out of her car because they are too busy chaising their tails out of district for a person that has no financial investment in your fire department?
Answer those questions and I might applogize for calling you stupid, probably not, but maybe.