We train a lot more, and are held to higher standards than before.
There is a lot more info out there now, a lot more knowledge. It takes more effort for sure. But, there are a lot of things in the business that can kill you too.We are better euipped and better trained to deal with more situations than before. And, with more than 80% of calls being medical, we have a lot more medical requirements. A majority of us in our district have gone to the local JC for EMT certification. I got mine initially in '99.
It is harder to keep folks, and harder to recruit.
In my district, we are primarily rural, with some bedroom communities. Most of the districts around here are a mixed full time and volunteer. My station is staffed 24x7 with three on the first out Engine, and two on a medic unit. We have a mix of staffed and unstaffed stations in the district.
We not only get called in if there is an incident, we also go in to provide constant coverage at the station. Last summer when we had lightening strikes, me and another volunteer provided coverage at one of our districts stations 30 miles from our own station.
Our district is pretty understanding about having family, kids ect. Becuase we have 7 staffed stations which provide our training, we can typically train at another station to catch up on a different day/eve. We have a few different trainings a month, spread between stations since our district is so large. My stations training is 1st/3rd wednesday of each month.
Recruitment is hard in my area too, because it is a bedroom community. Many people commute some distance to work. It's nt like the old days when most colunteers worked locally, and could(pretty much expected to) leave work to go to a call. Hard to do if you work 45 minutes away. And, companies in the city do not relate to that idea so much... You want to leave work why?... My previous job was really good about it though.
It's harder to get commitments from folks now too.
The other thing is, it is hard on the fire district when someone realizes how much of a commitment it can be, and drops out. It costs a lot these days to run a volunteer academt and to gear people up.