Posts Tagged: Volunteer
What’s your story?
It's been a great, long, hot summer --- causing me to take some time away from blogging to spend with my family and friends. Although I haven't been writing much, I have been doing a lot of reading and observing. And, it's my observation that the need f…
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You Call, We Haul
ANTIOCH -- Flames were shooting from her house. The homeowner, standing feet away from her home, was crying and yelling, “My baby. My baby is in there.” The firefighters donned their equipment and focused on their mission – saving lives. As they pu…
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Always on Call
Becoming a firefighter is no simple task. It is very time-consuming.
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The Battered Spouse Syndrome
Hypersensitive responses, long "he-said-she-said" narratives sound more like a battered spouse than a policy debate in Riverside, CA
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FF’s Get Look at Search & Rescue Vehicles
ST. MATTHEWS - The St. Matthews Volunteer Fire Department's search and rescue vehicles were on display at the new Caw Caw Substation on Murph Mill Road during the July 28 meeting of the Calhoun County Firefighters Association. Calhoun County Fire Commiss…
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Run-to-the-Curb Radio: Chief Tim Sendelbach
It’s like “Run-to-the-Curb Radio” — but better!
“Firefighter Storytellers” is a natural outgrowth from my popular “Run to the Curb” series — as it offers a radio show designed simply to facilitate kitchen table type discussions bet…
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Get Fit. Get Safe. Make It Personal.
[caption id="attachment_1745" align="alignleft" width="150" caption="My Three-Part Risk Management Plan: Alex, Laurie and Kathleen"][/caption]
Despite the fact that I wrote this piece for Fire-Rescue Magazine last year, I'm pretty sure its content is …
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Honoring The Past While Embracing The Future
If the motives behind a merger are based on a genuine concern for doing what is best for the community, a merger can be a whole lot less painful than many individuals make it out to be.
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Raising a flag about lowering THE FLAG!
It's after Memorial Day-2010 and I've been working on this blog for about a week, in hopes of having it finished prior to the start of the holiday weekend but life got in the way and that didn't happen.
In retrospect, I'm glad I procrastinated. I'm gl…
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Run-to-the-Curb is Top Story
[caption id="attachment_1811" align="alignleft" width="150" caption="That's me with Past Chief John Latimore, one of my best friends in the fire service and the neighborhood I grew up in."][/caption]
It's been more than a month since my presentati…
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@FireRECRUITER: Make the Right Investments
The following article tells of a small city that is threatening to stop collecting a voluntary public donation that has brought thousands and thousands of dollars in mission-critical equipment to their combination (paid/volunteer) fire department.
A…
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@FireRECRUITER: It’s EMS Week – Roll With It!
From www.FireRECRUITER.com:
In honor of EMS Week-2010, I thought I’d promote the (dare I say) sexiest video I’ve ever seen come to volunteer recruitment and retention.
“Roll With It!” is a part music video, part movie trailer — full-on hig…
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Tis’ the Season
One student was D.O.A. and the other seriously injured, requiring extrication and transport to the trauma center by helicopter; while the teenage driver was put through a full set of field sobriety tests, arrested and hand-cuffed in front of his peers.
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@Run-to-the-Curb: Planting a Seed.
It should be no secret by now that I have a passion for story telling, and especially telling of the importance of sharing stories in the fire service as a means of passing down our history, traditions and values.
It's almost an obsession.
It's got…
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The FDIC Experience: Returning Home
For the next four long hours I felt like I was in a scene from "The Terminal" --- the movie about an eastern immigrant stuck living in the airport with nowhere to go and unable to leave because he had no country to return to, and therefore no official citzenship anywhere.
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Live, from Indianapolis, it’s Saturday Morning!
[caption id="attachment_1732" align="alignleft" width="350" caption="ChiefReasonArt, Chris Naum and some other guy at FDIC 2009"][/caption]
Join Snyder NY Chief Tom Merrill and I for a live broadcast from the show floor of FDIC on Saturday-April 24 fr…
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Run and Hide – It’s Installation Season
The spring is a traditional time for many Fire Department installation ceremonies and dinners. It’s a cautious time for many PIO’s though. While these occasions should be a time to celebrate our department leadership and accomplishments, many in the community question the costs and motives of such events.
Drawing a visual picture that lies somewhere between a Romanesque orgie and the celebration of Attila the Huns birth, many citizens do not truly understand what one night out means to many firefighters and their loved ones.
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Going to the Show! See You in Indy.
I hope to see all of my loyal followers (both of them) at FDIC in a few short weeks. I'll be presenting "From the X-Box to the Box Alarm" on Thursday-April 22, 2010 at 10:30am in Room 127-128. There's room for 308 of my closest, most personal friend…
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@FireRECRUITER: Recruiting in a Gray Area
My helmet is off to the folks in the Syosset NY Fire Department for recognizing 40+ aged recruits as a viable part of the solutions to our recruitment and retention challenges.
Age is Nothing But a Number at Syosset Fire Dept.
Joining later in life is…
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Run-to-the-Curb Kids: Collect the whole set!
Rhett Fleitz at FireCritic.com has compiled one of the greatest collections of firefighter stories in hosting his first edition of the First Due Blog Carnival which asked our brothers and sisters to answer the question: "I am a firefighter because..."
…
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FireRECRUITER: The Art of Speed-Recruiting
If you had just 30 seconds to convince someone why they should join your volunteer fire department, what would you say?
What would your message be? Do you have a standard sales pitch that you use for just such occasions? Can you even say hello in 30 seconds?
I recently had the opportunity to coach and practice some speed-recruiting exercises with the Doyle Hose Co. 1 in Cheektowaga NY. They had been invited to be a part of career day at the local high school in their response area and they invited me to join them.
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It was in the cards.
The Evans Center Fire Hall (as we called it) was just down Bennett Road and around the corner on Route 5, maybe a few hundred yards away from my house, as the crow flies. Closer than that was the rear entrance to the sixteen acres of fire company property, directly across the street from our driveway.
Growing up so close to the firehall, it was an obvious choice as a place to hang out with my friends. We played baseball on the ball fields the fire company leased to the Little League for a dollar a year. We helped out at and patronized the carnivals and other fundraising events. When the fire company added on a large banquet hall in 1971, we helped the contractors move supplies and materials. My initials are carved in the concrete sidewalk they poured. I was eight.
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Re-Enlist.
I don’t know if it’s the fact that my father served in the US Army in two wars, my self-inflicted guilt for not serving in the military, or simply my love for country; but over the past several years I’ve experienced a growing appreciation for – OK, almost an infatuation with – our US Military and the men and women who serve in it.
My logical side admires these ordinary people who perform extraordinary missions in defense of our freedom.
My creative side is in love with the marketing machine that is the US Military.
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LIVE: Casting a Net over Recruitment and Retention Challenges
I've been asked by FireCritic and FireDaily to join them as their special guest on this week's edition of Firefighter NetCast.
Naturally, we'll be discussing volunteer recruitment and retention along with an overview of my presentation at FDIC in April and my cover story in the March edition of Fire-Rescue Magazine featuring my online book project: Run-to-the-Curb.com.
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Florida City Manager Battles Volunteers
Then, Arrington was tasked with hiring a fire administrator for the purpose of bringing the full time and volunteer firefighters under one leader and resisting the advances of Polk County Fire Service, who had proposed in early 2009 to take over fire service for Davenport. Residents had made it clear that they wanted a local fire department
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