MCVFA DONATES TRAFFIC SAFETY VESTS TO LOCAL FIRE DEPARTMENTS

Picture taken by Paul Vallone
Photo of Florida Fire Chief Michael Bedini showing off one of ten safety vests his department received from The Massachusetts Call/Volunteer Firefighters' Association


The safety vests were distributed to the 17 membership departments at Thursday night’s Berkshire County Fire Chiefs meeting which was held at the Florida Volunteer Fire Department’s station in Florida, Mass on November 20th.


The Massachusetts Call/Volunteer Firefighters' Association is donating 2,000 reflective traffic safety vests to approximately 170 local volunteer and combination fire departments who are members of the association.

Beginning November 24, 2008, new federal regulations require fire department personnel to wear approved reflective apparel when working on or near federally funded highways. This includes most major roadways in Massachusetts. The purpose of the regulation is to increase the safety of personnel working an emergency scene such as a motor vehicle accident by making them more visible to motorists. While current firefighter turnout gear does have reflective strips, it is insufficient to meet this new regulation.

This regulation requires fire departments to purchase vests that cost up to $50 each for each of their firefighters. With many departments' budgets stretched to the breaking point, this unfunded requirement is very difficult for small departments to meet.

The MCVFA purchased 2,000 Lakeland reflective, 5-point breakaway, fire resistant traffic safety vests through Brigham Industries of Paxton, Massachusetts. They will be distributed to member departments at regional meetings in November. The first of these meetings was held in Rehoboth on November 6.

Village Ambulance Service Winter/Spring 2009 - EMT-BASIC PROGRAM

Monday & Thursday Nights
6:00pm – 10:00pm
(Occasional Saturday classes TBA)
Classes Begin
Thursday, February 5th, 2009
To obtain an application packet visit our website
www.villageambulance.com and click on Training
Or
For more information, contact the Program Director,
Shawn Godfrey, at shawngodfrey@villageambulance.com or
by telephone at 413-884-5729
Program Cost: $750.00
($250.00 non-refundable deposit with application,
$500.00 due first night of class)
Cash, Money Order, Bank Check or Agency Check
Accepted
Village Ambulance Service is a Massachusetts OEMS Accredited Training Institution

Got spare time? Local fire departments need volunteers

By Meghan Foley, North Adams Transcript
Article Launched: 11/18/2008 11:08:44 AM EST


Fire chiefs of three North Berkshire communities say they need more manpower for their volunteer and on-call departments. Lanesborough has 22 to 25 volunteer firefighters, New Ashford has 12, and Williamstown has 18 active members of its on-call department, but despite these numbers, the fire chiefs say they need more.
"It's getting tougher and tougher to get people," Philip Rancourt, fire chief of the New Ashford Volunteer Fire Department, said Wednesday.

He said over the last 10 years, it has been more difficult to find members for a department in which he would like to have between 15 and 18 volunteer firefighters.

"It's a lot of free time you have to give," he said, explaining on of the reasons it is difficult to attract people.

In addition, in a town that has only 248 people, according to the 2007 U.S. Census estimate, there isn't a large population pool to draw from. And, Rancourt said, taking courses in firefighting and emergency response takes a lot of time.

While there are dedicated people who have been with the Fire Department for 30 years, he said they are getting "burned out," and it's harder to get younger people because they move out of the town.

Charlie Durfee, chief of the Lanesborough Volunteer Fire Department, said Thursday that 10 to 12 years ago, the department had 40 volunteers, but times have changed - people get married and have children, and with the economy the way it is, both parents have to work to support a family.

"It's
a huge commitment, and it's getting harder and harder to get people to volunteer," Durfee said.
When people joined the Lanesborough department, they used to receive a pager and turnout gear and get some training before they became volunteer firefighters, he said. Now they have to take courses in CPR, first aid and automated external defibrillators, along with learning about blood-borne pathogens and taking hazardous material training, he said.

In addition, Lanesborough requires volunteer firefighters to have Firefighter I and II certified training.

According to the 2007 U.S. Census estimate, the population of Lanesborough is 2,891.

Craig A. Pedercini, fire chief of the Williamstown Fire District, said Thursday that with parents spending more time at home with their children and going to activities their children are involved in, there is less time for volunteering. Williamstown's volunteers are paid, however, whenever they respond to fires or emergencies.

"Volunteerism is almost a thing of the past. We're not getting the same turnout as we used to," Pedercini said. At one time in the district's history, chiefs had to put people wanting to be volunteer firefighters on a waiting list, he said. "Fifteen to 20 years ago, we had as many as 30 members on the department," he said.

Pedercini said it is difficult to determine whether an 18-member fire department is adequate for Williamstown, which has a population of 8,108, according to the 2007 U.S. Census estimate.

"There is no real answer to whether 18 is enough to put out a fire because you would have to ask what size fire?" he said.

In the case of confirmed structure fires, he said, the district always requests mutual aid from other communities until the severity of the fires are determined.

"When we get fires, it has become common practice to get mutual aid from other towns," he said.

The lack of affordable housing in Williamstown is another challenge the fire district has faced in getting members because people have to live in the town to volunteer, he said.

While each fire department has training one night a week, they trade off with each other when it comes to hosting Massachusetts Firefighting Academy courses.

Rancourt said the majority of the time, his New Ashford volunteers go to Lanesborough for academy courses, and the two towns also train together. Durfee said Lanesborough also works with the Cheshire and Hancock volunteer fire departments.

Pedercini said the academy offers classes in Berkshire County in the spring and fall, and different departments will hold different classes.

The Cheshire and Savoy departments are in the midst of at 10-month Firefighter I and II training program funded from a grant received in April 2007 from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters. Besides Cheshire and Savoy, members of five other volunteer or on-call fire departments in Berkshire County are participating in the program.

Pedercini said having more local training would help with the recruitment and retention of volunteer firefighters, the majority of whom work at other jobs. Durfee said an answer to recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters may just be to keep applying for grants to use toward advertising and training.

For fiscal 2009, the Lanesborough department has a $70,200 budget.

New Ashford's department has a $7,500 operating budget, and the Williamstown Fire District functions on $446,000, with $92,000 paying to run the town's streetlights.

The Massachusetts Call and Volunteer Firefighters' Association is in the process of putting together a commercial intended to interest people in volunteering for their towns' fire departments.

Lanesborough is one of four Massachusetts towns across the state that will be featured in the commercial.

Pedercini, Rancourt and Durfee all said they are concerned what the future might hold for their departments if the number of volunteers keeps following the pattern over the past decade.

"We're all shorthanded," Durfee said. "I think being a regionalized fire department will happen sooner than you think."

Within the next three to five years, Lanesborough and New Ashford could become one department, he said.

"I don't know how much longer we can keep going, and we may eventually see some sort of regionalization here," Rancourt said.

Pedercini declined to speculate on the future of the Williamstown district.

Whole county to benefit from fire training

Photo by Holly Pelczynski/North Adams Transcript

Jason Mendonca of the Cheshire Volunteer Fire Department was among more than 30 Firefighters getting training on ladders Sunday at Hoosac Valley High School

By Meghan Foley, North Adams Transcript
Article Launched: 11/10/2008 11:19:10 AM EST



Monday, November 10
CHESHIRE -- Firefighters from seven Berkshire County communities responded to Hoosac Valley High School this weekend, not because of a fire but to learn national standards and protocol for dealing with one.
"We're really going to make proficient and efficient firefighters out of them," Joe Nedder of Cross Street Associates of Uxbridge, a consulting company that provides firefighter training, said Sunday.

Thirty-three volunteers from Cheshire, Savoy, Adams, Richmond, Lee, Windsor and Lenox are participating in Firefighter I and II training. The 10-month course has been made possible by the $665,962 SAFER (Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response) grant Cheshire and Savoy received last year from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is overseen by the Department of Homeland Security.

The grant, received in April 2007 was for recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters. However, Jim Pasquini, grant coordinator, said he was able to convince Homeland Security officials to allow some of the grant money to be used toward the training program, after which all participants will have an opportunity to take the Firefighter I and II certification exam.

"There is always a call for training in Northern Berkshire," Pasquini said.

Many volunteer firefighters don't have the opportunity to get training outside of their own departments, according to Nedder.

Pasquini and Nedder agreed that



offering the national training program locally is important for retaining volunteer firefighters.
"Being an on-call firefighter is a job. If you don't know what you're doing, you're not going to stay on the Fire Department," Nedder said.

Mark Therrien Jr., an apprentice with the Adams Volunteer Fire Department, said the skills and training he is learning from the program will help him get more involved with the Fire Department.

"It basically makes it a lot better now, because I understand everything," he said. "You fit in with everybody else better on calls."

Therrien, whose father has been a firefighter with the Alert Hose Co. in Adams for 22 years, said the town does offer firefighter training for two hours at night, once a week, and weekend classes once or twice a year, but it's a slow process.

"It takes a longer period of time to achieve the amount of training you get here (at the 10-month program)," Therrien said. "It just gives you a better opportunity to learn a lot of the equipment faster," he said.

The opportunity to learn also helps with retaining firefighters, Nedder and Pasquini said.

"These kids are excited and enthused because they are being properly trained to do their job," Nedder said. "This is a job where you have to keep learning and stay up to date."

He said prior to Sunday's class, which was about how to raise, climb and use ladders, most of the firefighters had never climbed a ladder, let alone the Adams' aerial ladder.

Because of the mutual aid system, the course will benefit all of Berkshire County, he said.

"It's not only helping us, but other communities," said Peter "P.J." Miner, assistant fire chief for Savoy and a participant in the course.

Cheshire Fire Chief Tom Francesconi, who was also participating, said every town in Berkshire County has mutual aid with other towns, and because of the training, he knows Miner will know how to "throw a 40-foot ladder," if the situation ever arises.

"We're all on the same page," Francesconi said.

By being trained to national standards, Miner said, the Savoy Volunteer Fire Department should technically be able to go anywhere in any state to assist another department.

The training program, which began on Sept. 12, will end in June with live fire training planned in Springfield. In addition to hands-on weekend courses once a month on topics such as motor vehicle extraction, the use of hose, water and foam to knock down a fire, ventilation and safety and survival during a fire, there are also lectures one to two nights per month, Nedder said.

In addition to Nedder, instructors from Northboro, Northbridge, Uxbridge and Douglas were assisting with the ladder training on Sunday. Nedder said other instructors, who include retired firefighters from cities such as Lawrence, Marlboro and Revere, will come out to teach or lecture throughout the 10-month program, which will cost roughly $80,000.

The remainder of the SAFER grant will be put toward buying new uniforms for the Cheshire and Savoy fire departments and scholarships for high school students from Adams and Cheshire interested in pursuing studies in emergency services, Pasquini said.

In addition, he said, grant money has already been used toward an evaluation of the Cheshire Volunteer Fire Department, recruiting volunteers for Cheshire and Savoy and offering CPR, first-responder and first aid courses to students at Hoosac Valley High School.