Wednesday, May 8, 2024
As a volunteer firefighter for the Gatesville Volunteer Fire Department, Carlos Campos joined with the desire to serve his community and learn something new.
Five years later, he realizes that his service is more than just responding to natural disasters and emergencies, but a calling to help others.
“I guess it gets in your blood and you enjoy it,” Campos said. “We’re all volunteers, and you do it because you want to do it and you want to help. The ‘thank yous’ are great, but you don’t get them all the time. You have your own joy on the inside that you actually did something.”
Most communities across Coryell County rely on eight volunteer fire departments as the first in line of defense for emergency response, including car wrecks, structure fires, natural disasters, medical emergencies, and more.
As one of the volunteer fire departments, Gatesville’s fire department protects 287 square miles that include the city, surrounding areas, and the six Texas Department of Criminal Justice prisons.
Although most of the fire departments across the United States are staffed by volunteers, the numbers are slowly declining, according to data from the National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC).
Following a summer of extreme heat and more than 1,000 wildfires across Texas this year, the need for volunteers is apparent. In Gatesville, Fire Chief Billy Vaden said the fire department responded to around 102 calls in August alone, a higher average than normal.
While they are always seeking more help, Vaden admits it can be a struggle to recruit volunteers since the work requires a great amount of sacrifice.
“You get people to join but they don’t want to give the time required,” Vaden said. “It’s a tremendous amount of time you give (away from) your family. I think it’s a big thing. Some people come in here thinking it’s going to be a glory job, but they find out the glory job has a lot of hours and a lot of work. And, so, they don’t want to get up in the middle of the night, and they don’t want to do all that is required.”
Operated by 34 volunteers, the majority also have full-time day jobs and families outside of serving as a firefighter.
“To me, I think about our spouses,” Campos said. “We’re here a lot of times more at the fire department, depending on calls, than we are with our spouses and children sometimes.”
Although the hours vary, the group can find themselves out responding to emergencies 7-12 hours a day, on top of weekly drills and training sessions each week.
“It depends on the day. Sometimes we love it because we have nothing for one or two days,” Campos said. “And then the next day you have eight calls and you’re here for 12 hours.”
For small and rural communities that depend on volunteer fire departments, transitioning to a paid fire department would be a major expense for the city and its taxpayers. For the City of Gatesville to transition to a paid department with the minimum full-time staff, Vaden said it would cost approximately $2 million.
“If the city were to employ six people that were dedicated to the firefighters and pay all their health insurance and everything else like that, that would be a significant tax burden that many people do not realize,” said Lee Walters, who has been a volunteer firefighter in Gatesville for about 15 years.
A firefighter’s job is always multifaceted, especially for volunteers. Vaden, who used to work as a paid firefighter in Waco, explains that most firefighters at paid departments have an assigned job or task. For many volunteer fire departments, a firefighter becomes a jack of all trades.
“We’re all firefighters, but we also got electricians, mechanics – we got everything,” he said. “You take all those people’s skills and that’s what makes a good fire department. You can pull from a lot of experience.”
Vaden said there is no exact assignment when it comes to responding to emergency calls. When the team’s pagers alarm, they count on whoever is available to get out and on the truck.
“When something like a construction fire comes in or a major accident comes in, you’ll get 25 or 30 people up here at one time,” he said.
Phil Gregory, who worked as a paid firefighter in Fort Worth before volunteering in Gatesville, also notes the higher chances of responding to an emergency involving a family member or friend when serving in a smaller community.
“In Fort Worth, I never knew anybody that I worked on. Well, it’s a lot different here,” Gregory said. “We pulled up at a wreck one night and I said, ‘hey that looks like my wife’s car and my kids sitting on the curb. That was my kids sitting on the curb, because it was my wife’s car.”
As the first in line for public safety, firefighters often witness devastating car wrecks, severe injuries, and death.
“Some people just can’t handle the trauma that comes along with it,” Vaden said.
According to the NVFC, most volunteer fire departments struggle to recruit younger members. Wyatt Faulkner, 20, is one of the youngest volunteers who recently joined the fire department just under a month ago.
While becoming a volunteer might not be for every person, he encourages people to consider volunteering to see if they will enjoy the work.
“The fires are fun, but sometimes you pull up on a car wreck, and you have somebody that’s deceased,” Faulkner said. “Sometimes that messes with people, and they can’t handle that, and sometimes it’s best for those people to stay out of it or stick to the fire calls. It’s just something that everybody has to try. If they do good in it, keep doing it, unless they decide it’s not for them.”
Despite the long hours and unpaid work, the volunteer firefighters are driven by the support of their community and the bond they have created with one another. At the fire station, people can often find stacks of water bottles and Gatorade donated by local citizens. “This is just a good community, and it supports us,” Vaden said.
“It’s kind of like a family. We get upset at each other every now and then, but when it comes out at the very end that person next to you is going to give their life,” Campos said.
