Firemen’s Association of New York Says Volunteers Save State Over $3 Billion

The Firemen’s Association of the State of New York, a group representing volunteer firefighters and emergency medical personnel, released an economic study that says the state’s volunteer fire service saves taxpayers about $3.87 billion each year in salary and benefits.

Should the state switch to a career-based fire service, the study suggests that 30,822 more firefighters would need to be hired, 1,300 new stations would need to be built or reconstructed and property taxes would rise on average 26.5 percent.

“Is there a cost savings because of volunteers? Absolutely,” said Niel Rivenburgh, deputy director of the Cayuga County Emergency Management Office. “Do they save us a substantial amount of money? Absolutely. Are we challenged with some big challenges in the future? Absolutely.”

Cayuga County officials have been discussing how best to get ahead of a decreasing number of volunteer firefighters—something that has been an issue across the state and across the country.

Though there are substantial cost savings to having volunteers, departments are finding it more difficult to have enough people to answer the call. That’s especially true during the workday.

While FASNY reported that it was able to increase the state’s number of volunteers by 20,000 through a $4.2 million Staffing for Adequate Fire & Emergency Response grant, numbers are still lower than what they used to be, and FASNY was not awarded a renewal of the grant for 2016.

“The reality is, volunteers have been around forever and ever, and we want them to get in front of the crisis, which is losing people and the impact that that has,” Rivenburgh said.”It takes a village to raise a child, but it really takes a county that works together, a county of 27 fire departments, to deal with today’s fires.”