Starting tomorrow, the Regional District of Central Kootenay (RDCK) will introduce a new recruitment initiative for volunteer firefighters. The primary objective of the program is to prepare volunteers for active duty in a more efficient manner. 

Previously, individual fire departments were solely responsible for the recruitment and training of their own firefighters. With the implementation of this new program, the aim is to conduct recruitment drives twice a year and provide training to incoming volunteers at the "RDCK Fire Training Academy" before assigning them to their respective fire departments.

Tristan Fehst, the regional deputy fire chief for the RDCK, says, “we’re hoping to speed it up and condense it to train them up in over a three month period.” With the previous approach some volunteers could take over one year to train.

There are currently 16 volunteer fire departments operating out of 17 fire halls within the RDCK. All RDCK fire departments must have a minimum of 15 volunteers, but ideally that number is over 20 per department.

For more information, go to www.rdck.ca/volunteer.

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