- Author
-
Lambertz, S.
|
Oster, G.
- Title
- 1998 Fire and Emergency Response Town Meeting Executive Summary. A Compilation of Information Gathered From Eleven Regional Town Meetings Discussing the Issues Facing Iowa's Fire and Emergency Response Departments.
- Coporate
- Fire Service Institute, Ames, IA
- Report
-
Town Meeting Executive Summary
January 1999
7 p.
- Keywords
-
fire departments
|
medical services
- Abstract
- The Iowa Firemen's Association, in cooperation with the Iowa State University Extension to Communities' Fire Service Institute, the Iowa Department of Economic Development, and Iowa Emergency Management Division conducted 11 regional town meetings for the purposes of discussing minimum training standards for fire departments. Training continues to emerge as the single largest area of concern for most fire fighters. No one argues that the life of a volunteer fire fighter is just as important as the life of a career fire fighter, but the concern is what level of training should become a standard and how the volunteer departments will meet the standard. The Training Fund at the State Fire Marshal's office is one strategy the IFA pursued to help address the financial aspects of training issues, but there are still departments that, for one reason or another, do not access it. This year, the 24-Hour Attack Fire Fighter Training course was offered as a joint venture with Iowa State University, Fire Service Institute and the community colleges. This has been very successful, and there have been record numbers of volunteers reportedly attending these courses, which are offered at no cost to the departments. The question: 'Should there be required minimum training standards for allfirefighters, and what should those minimum standards be?' was presented at the town meetings and community fire departments were asked for their input. Career departments, as well as volunteer departments stated that training is a major issue. While career departments may have the availability to train in-house, accessing training resources outside the department was not always within their budgets. Included in this report are a synopsis of the feedback received and some observations of the Iowa Firemen's Association, Fire Service Institute. 338 people attended the meetings from 154 communities. The questions are as posed to the participants at the meetings. The answers are consolidated.