Washington, D.C. – The International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) recently sent a survey electronically to more than 8,500 of its members to assess the potential impact of a military reserve or National Guard “Call-Up” to active duty and its effects on the Fire Service, particularly in the U.S.
The brief survey included 3 questions. The intent of the survey was to obtain the most accurate picture possible of whether or not the leaders of the fire service felt that their departments might face any effect from a military “call up” – and to try to assess to what degree the absence of fire and emergency response personnel might be expected to impact departmental budgets, staff/coverage, or other issues.
启动后第一个24小时内测量员ey, more than 700 fire and emergency services departments had responded. By the end of the third day, the survey had received more than 1,200 individual responses including more than 725 detailed “verbatims.” The final tally as of this summary was 1,271 total respondents or a 15.2% return rate with 861 additional comments.
Summary of Findings
The numbers show that a military call up, if it were to occur on a major scale across the United States, would have a modest effect on most departments. In terms of sheer numbers, the overall impact on fire department personneltaken as an aggregatewill be small. However, it is also clear that such a call up could significantly impact the smallest departments who are the least able to absorb either the loss of trained staff or likely to have the budget to replace them.
Simply stated: the larger the department, the more likely it will be able to withstand the loss of personnel in almost any category for indeterminate lengths of time.
Overall, 81% of the departments responding stated that they would suffer the loss of no more than 5% of their staff overall. Thirteen percent of the respondents stated that between 5% and 10% of their staff could be affected, and the remaining 6% of departments are anticipating a greater than 10% loss of staff coverage.
Of the personnel who might be affected, the vast majority (in 82% of the cases) will be firefighters followed by paramedic/EMS providers in 46% of the cases. Of significant concern is the fact that more than 11% of the staff losses reported by respondents are anticipated to involve the loss of chief fire officers.
Key Conclusions
Most Fire Chiefs were very clear as to how a call up might affect their departments; they already know who might be called, what duties would have to be transferred, and have a fairly solid idea of the ultimate financial impact on the department and municipality.
Most Chiefs have already put some kind of response plan into action, whether it involves the addition of temporary hires, leave policy revisions, the implementation of mandatory overtime or staffing/service changes.
绝大多数的受访者acknowledged a financial impact of some kind on the fire service resulting from the loss of Reservists. The severity of that impact had less to do with actual numbers of personnel involved and more to do with the size and type of the department affected.
Many departments noted that municipal budgets are under pressure right now from multiple directions. A Reserve call up is one more potential pressure.
Of those Chiefs who expect to be impacted by a Reserve call up, the most frequently cited concerns include loss of critical emergency skills, ( training and expertise), impact on apparatus staffing, service response times and overall operations.
Several Chiefs noted that much has been asked of America’s Fire Service since September 11th, and that many of these requests have resulted in additional financial burdens, just as a military call up will. They are already struggling to find ways to pay for all the new services that are now expected of them.
However, without exception, respondents indicated a desire to support any military call up request in any way possible if asked – even those departments who felt that a call up would have little affect on their operations.
