There are a lot of ways to make a fire department. Across the country there are full-time paid departments, combination departments with a core of full-time firefighters augmented by volunteers or part-time firefighters and many volunteer-only departments.

Curt Varone, director of public fire protection at the National Fire Protection Association, said fire departments evolve from all-volunteer fire brigades to professional departments.

He said historically, combined departments - mixing full- and part-time or volunteer firefighters - are a transitionary stage on the road to a full-time fire department.

Mr. Varone said as members of the public demand more types of services from fire departments, such as emergency medical service and search and rescue service, the burden is becoming difficult for all-volunteer companies to meet.

"I think what's changed is society's expectations," he said. "We've come to expect that we're not going to have a bad outcome."

Mr. Varone said communities tend to quickly adopt a full-time fire department following a major fire or disaster.

Local history proves his point. The city of Salamanca created a full-time fire department following a fire in 1923 that burned 10 blocks of the downtown. The city of Olean created a full-time fire department in 1894 following a blaze that burned most of its downtown.

But full-time fire and emergency medical service protection is expensive. Several members of the Olean Common Council want the community to take a hard look at whether a mix of full-time firefighters and part-time firefighters or volunteers could save the city money.

The Times Herald contacted several fire departments around the state that augment a core of full-time paid firefighters with volunteers or with paid part-time firefighters to find out how the departments work.

City of North Tonawanda Fire Department - full time/volunteer

The North Tonawanda Fire Department protects 33,000 residents with 37 full-time firefighters and 50 volunteers. The fire department's budget is $2.9 million. The department provides emergency medical service, but has no ambulance. The city contracts for ambulance service with a private company.

Fire Chief Joseph L. Krantz said full-time firefighters man station houses and drive fire engines and equipment to the scenes of emergencies.

"We manage a piece of fire-fighting apparatus with one full-time firefighter and the volunteers meet us at the scene," he said.

But all of North Tonawanda's off-duty paid firefighters are required to respond to emergencies as well. Chief Krantz said off-duty firefighters are paid their regular wage, not overtime, when they respond to a scene while off duty. The off-duty wages accumulate in a fund that's paid out at the end of the year.

"If it weren't for our off-duty firefighters responding, we'd be in big trouble," he said.

Chief Krantz has been with the department for 37 years. He said the full-time/volunteer system has been in place at North Tonawanda for more than a century. The main problem with the system, he said, is the full-time firefighters never know which volunteers will be at an emergency scene when they pull up with the fire engine. There could be seasoned veteran volunteers with years of service, or there could be nothing but trainees there with no experience.

He said he's often pulled up to a house fire to find 10 trainee volunteer firefighters standing in the yard waiting for him.

"It's pretty scary sometimes when you show up at a fire and you're it - you're the only guy there who knows what to do and the only one who can do an interior attack," he said. "Some of the volunteers are great and show up at every fire. But not all of them are like that."

State law mandates firefighters receive a minimum of 229 hours of training before they can begin fighting fires from inside a building. Basic required firefighter training is 78 hours, but Capt. Krantz said that only qualifies someone to put water on a fire from outside a building.

Capt. Krantz said volunteers at the department have up to five years to complete their training. The state and the city of North Tonawanda pay for the training and North Tonawanda spends about $2,000 per firefighter to equip full-time and volunteer firefighters with protective gear.

City of Corning Fire Department - full time/part-time

The Corning Fire Department is a combined full-time/part-time department. It has 24 full-time paid members and nine part-time firefighters who receive minimum wage but no benefits.

According to the city manager's office, the department's budget is $2.5 million. The Corning Fire Department provides fire protection and emergency medical service for 10,500 residents and several major industries, including Corning Inc. The department doesn't provide ambulance service. Ambulance transport is provided by Rural Metro Ambulance under a separate contract with the city of Corning.

Lt. Steve Mandell is a shift commander with the Corning Fire Department with 20 years of service. He said the department uses part-time firefighters to fill the shifts of full-time firefighter shifts when someone is injured or on vacation. The part-time firefighters aren't expected to respond to fire calls when they're not scheduled to work.

The department does all its training in house and pays for the 290 hours of training each full-time and part-time firefighter receives, he said.

"And they are paid during their training," he said of the part-time members.

Lt. Mandell said most of the part-time firefighters are younger guys in their 20s looking for full-time jobs with fire departments around the country. They come to Corning for training and experience.

"It works. We get along great will all the part-timers," he said. "The only thing I would say is an issue is turnover. They're paid minimum wage, so when they find something better, they move on."

He said most part-time firefighters stay with the department three to five years. Lt. Mandell said the Corning Fire Department has hired full-time firefighters from the ranks of its part-timers as well.

City of Salamanca Fire Department - full-time/volunteer

The city of Salamanca Fire Department is listed as a combined full-time/volunteer fire department on state records, but that's in name only, said Salamanca Assistant Chief Anthony Ellis.

The department has 19 full-time firefighters and a budget of $941,000. The Salamanca Fire Department provides fire protection and emergency medical service to 8,000 Salamanca residents and thousands of visitors to the Seneca Allegany Casino. Assistant Chief Ellis said the casino has recorded up to 8,000 visitors per day.

He said declining numbers of volunteers over the years has forced Salamanca to add more full-time firefighters.

He joined the department 12 years ago. Assistant Chief Ellis said when he came on board the department had 10 full-time firefighters.

He said 12 years ago, Salamanca had 15 active volunteer firefighters but the number of volunteers has dropped off. He said the department has records showing that some volunteers have responded to .5 of the department's emergency call outs in the last five years.

"There are no more active volunteers," he said. "But technically, as far as the state is concerned, it is still a combined department."

He said volunteer firefighter numbers have dropped off due to job and family pressures and increase training requirements from the state. People just don't have the time to volunteer anymore, he said.

He said volunteers also got tired of showing up at accident and fire scenes only to find the full-time firefighters wrapping up and leaving.

"When we get a call, we're out the door," he said.

Assistant Chief Ellis is a state fire instructor and the municipal training officer for Salamanca. He said national statistics show, full-time firefighters respond to emergencies on average within 3-4 minutes and volunteers respond within 8 to 12 minutes. He said there are many dedicated volunteer firefighters, but they start out at a disadvantage because they're not at the fire hall when an emergency call comes.

"When people need help, they need help now," he said.

City of Canandaigua Fire Department - full time/volunteer

The Canandaigua Fire Department has 15 full-time firefighters supplemented by 20 active volunteers. The fire department's budget is $1.5 million per year. The department provides fire protection and emergency medical service for 12,000 city residents. The fire department has no ambulance service. Private ambulance service is provided through a local hospital.

The department also provides fire protection to 6,000 residents in the town of Canandaigua but no emergency medical service. The department also protects a summer vacation population of 4,000 to 5,000 people.

Fire Chief Matthew Snyder said the department has three firefighters on shift all the time.

"Our off-duty full-time firefighters are on automatic call back if there is an emergency," he said. "The volunteers arrive at the scene."

All full-time firefighters carry pagers with them at all times, so they can be alerted.

He said due to a decrease in the pool of volunteer firefighters in recent years and increased demand for emergency services by residents, the Canandaigua Common Council hired a consulting firm, the Matrix Group, to review fire operations and make recommendations.

"The report came back and it said they need to hire five to 15 new full-time firefighters and increase the number of volunteers," Chief Snyder said.

He said the city council has formed a committee to discuss the recommendations and come up with options. Chief Snyder was asked to write a report as well.

He said he plans to recommend the department increase its full-time firefighter numbers to 18 and its active volunteer roster to 40 within the next five years even though it will likely push the department's budget past $2 million per year.

"I think there is support for it," he said. "We've had a lot of new development along the lakefront the last few years."

Contact reporter John T. Eberth at jeberth@oleantimesherald.com.

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