Volunteer Residency Requirements

[S. Cook]

Question to volunteers - What is your department requiring as far as time of residence in the area and distance to stations for volunteers?

[Marshal BHG 300]

We used to have the in district requirement, then we changed to allowing out of district volunteers, however the had less benefits than those that lived in district. They had to do more shifts a month to qualify for shift incentives. Now however the playing feild is equal. We found that we needed as many volunteers as possible and stifling them by treating them different was not good. Now it is set up that every volunteer has to make at least 3 calls a month and they get credit for one call by shifting even if they don't run any calls during their shift. In this day and age of the dwindeling volunteer a department has to do whatever it takes to recruit and retain. Hope this helps!

[FF26]

In our dept the membership requirement is that you must live within 1 mile of our protection district. This is mainly due to the fact that we require members to respond to the stations to staff the apparatus and we did not want the liability issue of someone traveling from greater distances.

[Kelly Tool]

In my department, according to the bylaws, a member must live within the protection district or in a protection district bordering ours. This was done so that if a member moved out of our district they didn't have to quit and join another. It also allows us a larger recruitement area. Also to increase membership, our bylaws permit a person who works regularly (40hrs or more) in our district to respond with us, regardless of membership with another department. What this means is that if your job permits, you can leave your job for a fire. This is helpful esspecially in the daytime. Hope this helps!

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