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<br />Saint Cloud Fire Department, MN <br /> <br />Fire Protection Master Plan- Executive Summary Document <br /> <br />For example, let's assume that the average percentage of all department incidents to which a paid-on- <br />call member responds (as an initial arriving company member) is 18%. Using this figure would result <br />in a calculation of 6 paid-on-call responders for each FTE of on-duty staff. <br /> <br />Using this formula would, for example, permit the City to consider that it would need to recruit and <br />maintain 18 new paid-on-call members in order to reduce the number of new career positions in the <br />future by three. In addition. the department would need to make certain these new paid-on-call <br />members maintained an initial response average of at least 18% of all calls. <br /> <br />Given that national statistics have seen the numbers of volunteer firefighters across the country drop <br /> <br />by 10% since the 1980's, the prospect of recruiting and maintaining a sufficient number of on-call <br /> <br /> <br />firefighters to have significant impact on reducing the long-term career staffing needs of the <br /> <br />department are dismal. The problem is cultural, as well as national in scope. and departments from <br /> <br />Maine to California are suffering- the amount of free time people have is decreasing while the amount <br /> <br />of time required for a firefighter's training and certification is increasing. This is not to suggest that <br /> <br /> <br />there is no value in those on-call personnel who are successfully recruited and retained. Many small <br /> <br /> <br />to mid-sized cities continue to use on-call personnel as an integral part of their safety force, providing <br /> <br />supplemental manpower to on-duty staff during emergency incidents and filling occasional vacancies <br /> <br />caused by leave. We recommend that Saint Cloud take this approach to the use of paid-on-call <br /> <br /> <br />responders. <br /> <br />It is also conceivable that part-time staffing could be considered. This would involve the scheduling of <br />part-time employees as a part of this on-duty staff. However, the on-duty staffing hours would still <br />need to be covered one for one. Each on-duty manhour would need to be covered by either full-time <br />career staff or a part-time paid firefighter, resulting in employee costs either way. The effective hourly <br />wage for a career firefighter' in Saint Cloud is $14.64 while the hourly wage for its paid-on-call <br />responders is $14.56. Any savings might be considered modest when considering the additional <br />issues involved in recruitment, scheduling, consistency and training. <br /> <br />With the additional operations staffing, there will be a need for increases in administrative and support <br />personnel. We anticipate the department maintaining a ratio of between 10 and 15 percent <br />administrative to operations staffing. Thus, we anticipate twelve administrative and support staff <br />positions will be needed as part of this long-term staffing strategy. <br /> <br />1 Firefighters as Grade C <br /> <br />12 <br />