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County leaders still examining paid positions at volunteer FDs
By Justin Goble
After more than three months, county leaders are still at an impasse about how to fill paid positions at each of the county’s seven volunteer fire departments.
Officials again discussed the matter Monday night (Dec. 1) in hopes of finalizing a job description so that the positions could be advertised starting Jan. 1.
Commissioners approved money in this year’s budget for one full-time position at each of the county’s seven fire departments. Around $30,000 was set aside for each position.
Last month, Commissioners Brian McMahan and Tom Massie raised questions about the jobs. Their main concerns at the time were salaries and how candidates for the job would be given credit for their experience if they had served as a volunteer firefighter.
Finance officer Darlene Fox told commissioners that a firefighter with 30 years volunteer experience would only make around $4,000 more per year than someone with no experience.
Though commissioners were fine with those figures, questions still arose when county Manager Ken Westmoreland presented another draft of the job description Monday night.
“Did we delete everything we need to delete from this draft?” Massie asked. “That’s something we need to decide upon. One thing I see in here is that they have to be a member of the fire department. That’s something I don’t think should be in there. They could be a member of the fire departments if they want to, but that shouldn’t be a requirement.”
Westmoreland said that would be up to the individual fire chiefs. Under the current draft of the job description, it states that the employees will answer to them.
“It may be a requirement of the individual fire departments,” Westmoreland said. “They can require them to have certain certifications. Some departments might require them to be first responders while others might make it a strictly clerical position.”
For his part, Massie wanted the description to be clear about the fact that the county would not be hiring paid firefighters.
“It could be interpreted that we are,” he said. “We want them to be able to prepare for or respond to fire and emergency calls, not to prepare for and respond to fire and emergency calls.”
According to Massie, the “and/or” distinction is important because the county employees would not necessarily be required to respond to emergency calls.
Another issue McMahan brought up is that fire chiefs may apply for the jobs. While commissioners said that would be fine, that issue raised some concerns with the current job description.
“We want the people who fill these positions to answer to the chiefs,” McMahan said. “We might want to look at that language. My concern is that we may have fire chiefs (who want to) apply for the jobs and this (language) would preclude them from that. We don’t want the chiefs (who want) to apply (to) be knocked out of consideration or be left without supervision.”
Westmoreland said in such an instance the chief would answer to the fire department’s board.
These discussions came after several fire chiefs spoke about the positions last month. Those present said a clerical position would be welcome due to the large amount of paperwork involved with running the fire department. However, they said it would be best for insurance purposes if the person who fills that position is a member of the volunteer fire department.
Commissioners will write another draft of the job description, which will be reviewed during their regular meeting on Monday, Jan. 5.
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