PUTNEY — For the past few years, Putney Fire Chief Tom Goddard has warned the public, and the Selectboard, that without new members, his department - and the town - could be in trouble.
The Putney Fire Department's proposed Fiscal Year 2020 budget reflects, in part, attempts to increase membership by helping current and potential firefighters afford training sessions - and stay healthy.
Goddard appeared at the Oct. 24 regular Selectboard meeting to introduce the fire department's proposed budget. He noted it's “up a fair amount for specific reasons,” and two of those reasons are directly related to membership recruitment and retention.
“Those two requests come at the end of a [long] review, study, input, and discussion,” said Goddard, and were voted affirmatively and unanimously by the fire department's members, he added.
The first is for the town to fund physical exams for all Fire Department members. During their internal discussion, firefighters decided that offering this annually was too expensive, so the proposed budget covers exams every other year.
“The reasons are pretty significant,” Goddard said.
Early detection
The demands of modern firefighting, which include possible exposure to harmful materials, make it “well worthwhile to identify, as soon as possible, if, in fact, there is an issue” with a member's health needs and problems, especially in respiratory function and cardiovascular system, he said.
Early cancer screenings are also crucial, Goddard said, because “cancer threats are real.” Additionally, he mentioned the need for “mental wellness for our folks,” as first-responders are likely to experience or witness traumatic events, sometimes repeatedly.
Goddard said he is working with Clear Choice MD, the urgent care facility in Brattleboro, on a contract with the town. He noted they have physicians trained specifically to work with firefighters and emergency medical service providers.
The Putney Fire Department's second new initiative to improve recruitment and retention is to compensate members for their time during training.
But, Goddard noted, the members accepted a lower hourly rate than that paid for calls. “They decided to accept minimum wage for training,” he said.
Their hope, he said, is that this funding will help the department attract new members, and will benefit future members.
Goddard noted this initiative will cost money, but it doesn't have to increase the budget.
He noted there are funds remaining in the FY19 budget's Fire Department Building Improvement line item, and the associated project was completed last year. If they can transfer money from that fund, it will pay for this second initiative.
Heating and mutual aid
The Fire Department Building Improvement budget can also help fund the medical exams program, Goddard said. An additional transfer option is from the building's heating costs line item.
This past summer, Goddard said, the fire department had a heat pump installed in the apparatus room. Because of this, they are already seeing a significant reduction in heating oil use.
Additional budget increases for FY20 include a slightly higher mutual aid assessment - it's going up by 3 percent - and a 10 percent rise in employee health insurance costs.
“That's the largest increase we've ever seen,” on the latter, Goddard said.
Payroll is also rising a little bit, Goddard said, because the department's “call volume is up [and] our durations of incidents, per incident, is up."
One major source of financial relief could be a FEMA and Department of Homeland Security Assistance to Firefighters Grant.
Goddard told the Board he had applied for just under $190,000 from this fund to pay for all new breathing apparatus and rescue tools. But the grant requires a 5 percent local match, so Goddard added $12,000 to the budget in case they are approved for this funding.
He assured the Selectboard that “no expenditures [will come] from that line item” without Board approval.
Selectboard Chair Josh Laughlin told Goddard he supported the fire department's search for grant funding, and the town could ask voters to approve $10,000 per year in a restricted fund to cover future local matches.
The Board will revisit the FY20 proposed Putney Fire Department budget as the season's workshops progress, said Laughlin, who noted the budget Goddard presented “seems like a good start.”