Volunteer Role a Vital One
Q&A with Ken Knipper, Chair, National Volunteer Fire Council EMS/Rescue Section; NVFC Kentucky Director
Coming out of 9/11, what did you see as the greatest needs for volunteer EMS in its preparedness for terrorism and major MCIs? And how have we done at meeting them?
Looking at the overall picture, the government pumped a tremendous amount of money toward the emergency services to be ready if something like that happened again. And I'm not so sure EMS ever really got its full part of that. I think in my area, the greater Cincinnati area, EMS came out better with UASI [Urban Areas Security Initiative] funds in getting the trailers, decon units, things like that, than we did under the FIRE Act [Assistance to Firefighters] grants. There's money available to EMS under FIRE Act grants, but it's not enough, and it's not taken advantage of as much, quite frankly, because of the complexity of the forms and things like that.
Is that body of knowledge required to work the grant process more of a problem for volunteer services than for paid?
Yeah, because they're part time and have other things to do. The states have spent a lot of time--Kentucky has, anyway--educating people on how to do it. There's a lot of help available, but I find a lot of times the volunteer departments just don't take advantage of it, or they get involved in the process and say, ‘Well, it's too much, we can't do this.'
Are there states where the volunteer community is doing better than in others?
I think so. New Jersey is the first state group that's asked to be a member of the NVFC's EMS/Rescue Section. New York is one of the premier states in the way they handle volunteers. I mean, they have a retirement home for volunteers that doesn't cost a guy a dime! It's amazing what they do up there.
In this tough economy, how can we sustain what we've achieved?
It's going to be tough. They're trying now to cut the grants down to about a third of what they were at the start. So you have that, and you have all these cities in trouble, costs are increasing, and volume's increasing. It's a lot of pressures from a lot of angles right now.
For volunteer services, what are the priorities moving forward?
Community involvement is extremely important--we have to recruit constantly. And the other thing is retention. You have to be flexible and empathetic about scheduling, and take what you have available from people.
As 9/11 recedes into history, what are the big lessons younger providers should take from it and carry forward?
One of the things I like to cite--and very few people know this--is that after 9/11, EMS in the city of New York, I've been told by people up there, was basically run by volunteers for over 40 days. Across America, the backup is very often volunteer. The public has to know that. In the last 2-3 years, the biggest department in my county went from 15 people per shift to 11. The backup comes from two combination departments and a volunteer department that sits right below them. And the volunteer department, sometimes I kid, they're probably spending more time in the other station than their own.
The need for the volunteer is not going to go away. About 80% of this country's geography is covered by volunteers. They've made some good gains and provide excellent service for their community, but right now it's difficult to maintain.
