Joel Nelson is an assistant chief at West Metro Fire, serving both New Hope and Crystal. As is the case for fire departments across the country, they're looking to fill positions left vacant during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“So this fall we're looking to bring on 10-12 more recruit firefighters,” Nelson says. “We had to change our operations during COVID with duty crews, and when we came back to our paid on-call model, it just didn't fit as well as it did for some of the people, and they decided that either retirement or moving on was better for them.”
West Metro Fire typically hires new firefighters every other year and keeps crew numbers in the mid-fifties. Nelson anticipates numbers will drop to the high forties by November when new recruits are hired.
“So this year I'd say probably January, February, we really started looking at it, going, ‘we think we're going to have to hire again this year’,” says Nelson. Where normally we wouldn't have. We would have waited until ’23 to hire.”
Applicants must be 18 years old, have a diploma or equivalent, and have a valid driver's license. They also must live within six minutes of a West Metro Fire Station with preference given to those living within four minutes.
“Response time is the most important thing,” Nelson explains. “If there's a medical emergency or a house fire or something like that, getting the firefighters here, getting them in their gear and getting them on the road as soon as possible is paramount.”
Recruits make $12.50 an hour. That bumps up to $15 an hour as an apprentice and just over $18 an hour as a firefighter.
“And then we have nearly a $9,000 a year pension program,” Nelson says. “So for a part-time job, it's an incredible pension incentive.”
There's paid training with many recruits who often know nothing about firefighting.
“Some of these recruits and candidates have never been on a ladder or use the chainsaw, let alone fire hoses or anything like that,” Nelson told WCCO’s Mark Freie. “By the time they're done with the academy, they will be proficient at all of those things.”
West Metro Fire on call positions are designed to work around full time schedules and they're looking for help primarily on nights and weekends.
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