Here in Frederick County, Maryland, we are fairly well integrated and yes, we do have many issues, but we have been working on resolutions for several years. We have approxamaelty 350 career personnel and approximately 900 volunteers (I would say about 65% are active) spread across the county. For the most part we have intergated Fire/EMS, although we do have a few separate EMS and Fire Companies. My station (Independent Hose Co #1), has the highest number of Fire and EMS calls in the county and responds with the career staff handing approximately 85% of the EMS calls and approximately 50% of the Fire calls. We have a number of young bucks that live at the station who are required to respond to calls while at the satiation, so we have fairly good volunteer response.

On the technical rescue side of things, we have percentage wise, a very small number of calls, but have the greatest amount of training to undergo. At 55, I am the second oldest member of the team and for the most part (I have had two situations with severe heat/dehydration issues) keep up with those much younger. I try and work smart not harder, whenever possible. I have no idea how much longer I will be able to respond, but hope I can for at least another 5-7 years, we’ll see.

Recruitment of volunteers is tough, especially with all of the training requirements before an individual can even ride apparatus. We require Firefighter I, First Responder and HazMat Ops, before you can ride on the fire side of the house; this represents at least 150 plus hours of training, making it challenging to recruit and retain volunteers.

Pete