Running head: PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 1

Professional Firefighter

Richard Glover

Honors Paper

University of Florida

PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 2

Abstract

The role, responsibilities, and the significance of the firefighter or the fire officer have evolved over the history of fire protection services. Of the professions that are identified as public safety that include police, fire, and the emergency medical system (EMS), none of the professions have had to explain, justify and adapt their occupation as much as the fire department. Firefighting has evolved from a predominate volunteer commitment from individuals at the community level of the society to being significant career personnel that is part of local and state governments’ obligations to provide public safety to the public. Fire departments have enhanced and expanded their skillfulness to better serve the communities that rely on public safety and to defend their profession to elected officials, community leaders, community stakeholders, and the citizens of the community. The value and importance of the fire department is always in question during budget negotiations when elected officials in local communities are determining where to spend financial support. Because over the last three decades the world has experienced many natural and manmade catastrophic disasters emergency management is a priority of local, state, and federal governments. The fire department and the firefighting profession is the most logical industry to adapt their role to better prepare, respond, and to assist with the mitigation and recovery policies for communities that are impacted by disasters. The greatest way for both to adjust their responsibilities to fulfill this public safety need is to validate their profession with higher education requirements. PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 3

Professional Firefighter

Introduction

The role of the firefighter is one that has evolved and adapted to the needs of the community for which it serves. Every community and its citizens have placed different expectations and responsibilities on those members who have chosen to be firefighters. When communities and its citizens are presented with the question “What is a firefighter and what does he or she does?” the answers will vary from one community to another. According to the World

Population Review (2020), in 2018 the United States had 19,495 incorporated communities.

There are probably as many answers to this question as there are communities. This is both a positive and negative for the firefighter profession. Firefighters have been described as paramedics, EMT, first responders, rescue technicians, civil servants, volunteers, and professionals. There are many more descriptions for what firefighters are and what they do, but no one only describes them as only firefighters or believe they only extinguish fires. This is because firefighters are a valuable part of the public safety professionals that protect local communities and is a key element of the communities' pre-hospital care that responds to all the emergencies and disasters that can impact a community. Fire departments have adopted the title of being All-Hazard Response departments (FEMA, 2020). By providing multiple public safety services to the communities over the history of firefighting the organizations are a necessary expense that is becoming more expensive. Despite all the public safety services that the firefighter has embraced to provide to the communities they are most often asked to find ways to cut their budgets, justify their value, and to do more for less. The firefighter must continue to develop and define the profession through increased education challenges that support the PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 4 concept that the fire officer is the most ideal person or profession to be a community’s emergency manager during an emergency crisis.

Firefighting Before America

The resourcefulness and threats of fire were long recognized before communities and fire protections were developed in the United States. Before the development of the Roman Empire, the threat of fire was acknowledged by many civilizations and under the rule of Emperor

Augustus, the empire developed its first fire brigade. Because of the unsuccessful efforts of private fire protection to battle configuration with groups of slaves called Triumviri Nocturni

(three men of the night), the Roman Empire developed fire brigades that resembled the fire brigades in Ancient Egypt. For the protection of the Roman Empire and after a fire destroyed a large portion of the community, Augustus organized a fire brigade with a group of watchmen over the community called Corps of Vigiles who patrolled the community for public safety and fire protection. The men patrolled the community with buckets to fight fires and were nicknamed

Sparoli which means little bucket fellows. There was a shortage of volunteers for the Vigiles and

Augustus offered citizenship and salaries to those who joined the Vigiles. Even with the development of the fire brigade, citizens were required to be diligent in their efforts to assist and support the volunteer fire protection for the community in the event of a fire (Canter, 1932).

Firefighting in America

Throughout American history, firefighting has not always had the pleasure that other professions have had and has not been seen as a service that deserves to be paid for. In the early years of the United States, civilizations had determined firefighting was a duty for everyone to engage in for the security and safety of the community. It was expected for everyone to contribute to the efforts of putting out fires that impacted the safety of the local community. It PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 5 benefited every able body to assist with emergencies that involved fires because the potential of damages from the spread of the fire was reasonable if a neighbor or establishment did not quickly control or extinguish a fire. According to a firefighter, fire historian, and author Paul

Hashagan, (2003) the first English settlement was in Jamestown, Virginia, and was established in

1607. The Virginian Company of London had designated Captain John Smith as one of the leaders of the colonization of the new country, America. As the success of the colonization of

America improved more immigrants began to land on the shores of the new world and the community began to expand. The community had an increase in the building of wooden structures and Smith was one of the first community leaders to notice the increase in the potential of the fire threats in the community as more wooden structures were built to accommodate for the increase in the number of settlers that arrived. The community was severely damaged by a catastrophic fire in January 1608, Hashagan (2003) stated, “The devastating fire destroyed most of the colonists’ provisions and lodgings” (Para. 3). The threat of fire continued to be a concern throughout the seventeenth century. Boston, New York, and Philadelphia rapidly became popular communities because of the harbors in these communities served as entry points for resources, new arrivals to the country, and referred to as Harbor Cities. Housing became an issue and homes were built very close to one another, with roofs made of straw and wooden chimneys that caused a serious fire threat according to Deborah Threadgill (2020), a contributing writer with the Collectors Journal. Captain Smith is quoted to have said, “I begin to think that it is safer for me to dwell in the wild Indian country than in this stockade, where fools accidentally discharge their muskets and others burn down their homes at night” (as cited in Hashagen, 2003, Para. 3).

The State House in Jamestown caught fire multiple times and was relocated after each fire because of the extensive fire damage after each fire that eventually caused state leaders to move PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 6 the State House to Williamsburg and this was a decline of Jamestown to an agriculture community (Werner, 2007).

Because fire continued to be a threat during the Colonial times, Governor Peter

Stuyvesant in the mid-seventeenth century passed fire safety laws, home fire inspections, and issued fire safety fines to those that did not adhere to proactive fire safety measures (Threadgill,

2020). The Governor organized eight volunteer men referred to as the Rattle Brigade that performed Rattle Watch at night as they patrolled the streets with wooden rattles and used them to alert citizens of fires that were discovered. Citizens would awaken and assist with the extinguishment of fires located by the Rattle Brigade. Hashagen (2003) stated, “This is generally recognized as the first step in organized firefighting in America” (Para. 7).

Volunteer Firefighters

Even after the catastrophic fires that impacted the early American communities, firefighting was largely considered a volunteer service that everyone in the community participated in when a structure was on fire. Public services like the sheriff, doctor, blacksmith, and even the saloon owner was considered services that individuals received a fee for providing to the community. Threadgill (2020) described early firefighting by stating “In the early days putting out fires was primitive at best. The first response of community members would be to form "bucket brigades"--neighbors around the fire would toss buckets into the street so that volunteers could fill the buckets with water from a well or nearby water source and pass it forward to each successive man, woman or child down the line” (Para. 5). Fires have always been a real threat to public safety and uncontrolled fires significantly endangered lives and had the potential to cause extensive property damage that could devastate a community. Everyone in the community was needed to manage fires and to bring unchecked fires under control. PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 7

During the seventeenth century and at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the threat of fire to life and property continued and with the development of the Harbor Cities, local governments began purchasing resources such as engine pumpers to combat fires in their communities. It was not until the early years of the eighteenth that communities began to organize large scale volunteer groups called Fire Clubs who were recognized as the communities’ volunteer firefighters and were responsible for fire protection (Icard, n.d.). One such fire club that was established was the Mutual Fire Society and organized because of the large configurations that happened between the mid-seventeenth and the early eighteenth centuries. Better known as a politician, printer, inventor, diplomat, author, and scientist,

Benjamin Franklin witnessed one of the large configurations at a young age and this may have influenced the concerns he had about fire protection (Benjamin, 2014)). Many of the fire clubs had selective fire protections that provided fire protection to a select few citizens and members of the fire club. Fire protection was not a service provided to all its citizens. Franklin did not agree with the practices of these fire clubs and was quoted in his local newspaper, The

Pennsylvania Gazette,” wanted organizations that would battle all fires, regardless of whose property was burning” (as cited in Weebly, n.d., Para. 5). Many of the fire clubs were organized by insurance companies that would extinguish structure fires of those who were insured, or the club would extinguish fires of the properties owned by its club members. Volunteer firefighters would receive payment for extinguishing fire in insured properties and properties that were insured had marks on them known as fire marks so firefighters would know which fires they would receive payment for extinguishing paid by the insurance company (Threadgill, 2020). The

Union Fire Company was Philadelphia’s first fire company and was created by Franklin in 1736 with Isaac Paschall as the first-fully fledged volunteer firefighter (Weebly, n.d.). Volunteer PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 8 firefighting became a widespread service provided by many prominent professionals and persons in history. According to Weebly (n.d.), “Some famous Americans who served as volunteer firefighters were: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Adams,

John Hancock, Paul Revere, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, John Barry, Aaron Burr, Benedict

Arnold, James Buchanan and Millard Fillmore also served as volunteer firemen” (Para.7).

Franklin later started the first homeowners' insurance company in 1752 which did not become a common practice until the nineteenth century when the volunteer fire companies were described as types of fraternal orders or social clubs of those who described themselves as manly heroes (Landers, 2016).

The firefighting profession began to change in 1853 when the first paid fire department was established in Cincinnati, Ohio. The department was a fully paid fire department that was led by a well-respected volunteer firefighter named Miles Greenwood who had experience working with steamed operated equipment and was asked to train the department’s newly paid firefighters in the operations of the recently purchased steamed fire pump engine (Cote, 2004).

According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) following the hundred and sixty years after the first paid fire department was established 85 percent of the nation's fire departments were providing fire protection with all-volunteer or mostly volunteer firefighters

(Bodin, 2017). The responsibility for extinguishing fires probably remained a predominant volunteer service because of the decline in the number of fires and the success of volunteer fire protection. The number of fires in the United States has declined between 2009 and 2018 according to the U.S. Fire Administration but the number of fire deaths and the dollar cost of damages caused by fires has risen in that same time. The number of alarms that fire departments respond to has increased in the last thirty years because the primary types of alarms are not PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 9 generated by fire alarms and volunteer fire departments have a problem with recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters to keep pace with the number of alarms that local fire departments are responsible to respond to (Bodin, 2017). From 1986 to 2018 the fire service has seen an increase of 56 percent of career firefighters in communities with 67 percent of all firefighters working in communities with a population of at least twenty-five thousand people (Evarts & Stein, 2020).

Firefighting Transition

In the United States, the evolution of the firefighter from a volunteer public safety servant to a career civil servant had a minimal impact on the fire protection services in four centuries, and most of the firefighters remained to be volunteers. In the mid-nineteenth century, the firefighter began a transition to provide more services to help provide public safety. Because of a chaotic pre-hospital emergency medical system, there was an increase in the number of pre- hospital traumatic deaths and there was a growing federal concern for patient care prior to patients who arrive in the hospital. In 1966, the Accidental Death and Disability: The Neglected

Disease of Modern Society report, commonly called the White Papers, made specific suggestions on how to improve pre-hospital EMS in the U.S. pertaining to the level of care provided by firefighters (Edgerly, 2012). The U.S modern emergency medical system (EMS) is believed to be based on an emergency transportation system for injured French soldiers created by Jean

Dominique Larrey (Shah, 2006). Larrey is considered the first military battlefield surgeon and the pioneer of battlefield traumatic medicine and triage. The U.S. federal government began to encourage state and local governments to require firefighters to become certified first responders or risk losing federal funding. This later transitioned into firefighters becoming emergency medical technicians - ambulance (EMT-A) in 1969 and in 1970 the development of emergency PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 10 medical technician - paramedic [EMT-P] (Edgerly, 2012). By 1972 America was introduced to the TV series “Emergency”, the show was about two Los Angeles County firefighters who were paramedics. Edgerly believed this established an expected level of care from the fire departments by the community after the public had watched the popular TV show for five years (Edgerly, 2012). This caused a noticeable increase in firefighters receiving national training, certifications, and education in providing 911 responses for emergencies from accredited educational institutions.

Firefighting Education

In the 1980s the International Association of Firefighters started a basic educational structure underlying a college system of courses that established the foundation for the bachelor and associate degree programs for the fire service with the United States Fire Administration

(USFA) and the National Fire Academy in Emmetsburg, Maryland (Hanifen, 2019). Due to the fire service using State certifications for firefighter and do not require a criterion for the fire officers from most State’s fire colleges it is not a requirement for the fire officers to receive a degree. The qualifications to be a fire officer are left up to each individual fire department.

Obtaining a two-year or four-year degree is a personal decision for fire officers. The National

Fire Protection Association (NFPA) at the end of the nineteenth century began establishing national fire service recommendations that many States use to develop their State firefighter minimum standards, but all States do not accept State firefighter certifications from other

States. Schools that offer Fire and Emergency Services Higher Education degree programs

(FESHE) began to meet during this same time period annually to develop the curriculum for the courses of studies for colleges in the U.S (Hanifen, 2019). The last forty years of fire science education has had a significant impact on the professionalization of the firefighter, but the lack of PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 11 creditable fire educational institutions is not the problem. The biggest obstacle for the first four hundred years of the fire service education may have been the firefighter’s resistance to certification, education, and continued education. Robert Avsec, a retired battalion chief and instructor at the National Fire Academy believes this continues to be an obstacle to the professionalization of firefighting because the fire service disagrees with mandatory educational requirements (Avsec, 2019). Many of the certifications that the fire service has developed or some the certifications that fire departments require firefighters and fire officers to obtain many of the State’s fire service regulatory agencies resist making it mandatory to have specific higher education requirements for the fire officer. The NFPA Research Foundation issued a report that compared the fire service continued education with that of other professions, EMS, nursing, law enforcement, and teachers continued education programs to develop recommendations for a continued education program for the fire service that lacked a continued education system equal to other public safety professions (McCallister & McCallister, 2019). According to Thomas E.

Poulin and Hilda’s Moses's article, “The public tends to view professions as tied not only to professional certification and licensure, but also to education, especially at the higher levels, yet many in the fire service routinely argue against mandating educational requirements, either for the discipline or for their own agency” (as cited in Avsec, 2019, Para. 2).

Fire Officer and Emergency Management

After September 11, 2001, the terrorist attacks on the United States changed the way the federal, state, and local governments approached public safety and emergency management. This event forever changed the view the country had on the importance that a comprehensive emergency response would have on the security of the nation. Dr. Ray H. Chang and Dr. Dave

Neal (2019) correctly explained that the 1979 National Governor’s Associations report on the PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 12 concerns that governors had about the country’s national emergency policies prompted the development of the Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA). The report focused on the failures of federal aid or the lack of confidence the States had in the federal government's ability to provide adequate aid during natural or manmade disasters. FEMA created four phases to emergency management to provide a framework for the improvement in the way the country would respond to emergencies. Chang and Neal (2019) described FEMA’s 1979 philosophy on emergency management as a fact-finding and investigative approach to managing disasters or emergencies when the local or State resources were overwhelmed. After the September terrorist attacks, FEMA was absorbed into the newly created Department of Homeland Security (DHS) because the federal government had determined that natural or manmade disasters could threaten the country’s national security. The four phases of emergency management remained as the core principles of FEMA’s federal emergency management guidelines: hazard mitigation, preparation, response, and recovery (FEMA, 2011). Everyone does not support the idea that the fire officer is the most prepared to assume the role of the emergency manager. Chang and Neal

(2019) categorized the emergency manager as a position required to have a wide range of knowledge, skills, and abilities that allow the emergency manager to manage the four phases.

Having a thorough understanding of the four phases and how to implement them is critical.

Chang and Neal (2019) further explained,” Much of these activities often focus on networking and coordinating activities among public, private, and volunteer sectors and other related skills” (Pg. 9). After referring to the NFPA recommendations to what a fire officer’s duties are,

Chang and Neal (2019) had determined the fire officer performs some duties similar to the emergency manager but is not required to have the knowledge, skills, or abilities essential to the emergency manager. The fire service foundation began on the concepts of volunteers and has PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 13 always incorporated assistance from the public and private organizations through networking and coordinating activities to manage emergency responses. Through the fire inspections division, some fire departments play a role in mitigating disasters by performing commercial fire inspection of organizations and issues warnings to violators. The tradition of the fire service is to protect life and property through preparations by developing a comprehensive emergency response plans to disasters. The local fire departments have the resources and personnel to assist with the community recovery activities after a large-scale emergency or disaster. The fire service indirect connection to many of the community recovery efforts is a benefit and servers as a resource for the public and private stakeholders to gain access and information to their recovery needs. Chang and Neal (2019) disagree that the fire service and or fire officer is the most ideal discipline to assume the lead role to a community's emergency response. They identify the fire service as agencies that focus only on the day-to-day preparations and responses to emergencies and disasters and lack a detailed understanding of mitigation and recovery activities in a community emergency response plan (Chang & Neal, 2019). After the September terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina disaster, the federal government shifted from the trial and error approach to managing emergencies and disasters to a philosophy of improving a community’s self-reliance as the core principles to emergency management (FEMA, 2011). By strengthening the local resources and using the resources within a community and mutual aid agreements before requesting state and or federal aid will improve the federal response to disasters and emergencies while preserving it. A lot of these responsibilities and challenges fell on to the fire service through the local levels of governments, its elected officials, and community leaders.

Proactive fire departments should be as involved in the mitigation and recovery efforts in a community’s emergency response plan as they are in the preparation and response activities. PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 14

Some examples of the way the fire service can increase their involvement in these areas are through building and fire codes enforcement, improving the disaster notification process, and acquiring federal grants for the local community to assists with the emergency and disaster recovery activities. It is important that the fire service remain a significant participant in all four phases of the emergency management process.

Conclusion

The fire service has a history that has focused on public safety ever since society discovered fire. The role of the firefighter has changed and adapted to the needs of the community, sometimes to preserve its own existence. The fire department has transitioned to an all-hazard department because the firefighter has evolved over the last five centuries since the first colonists landed in Virginia in 1607. Of the three public safety disciplines, law enforcement, fire, and EMS, the fire service has been the most reluctant to embrace a national standard that is built upon nationally accepted educational and certification standards. This reluctance has allowed communities the flexibility to describe the role of its local firefighter and their fire department to the needs of its community. The slow acceptance of a national educational standard has hampered the role of the firefighter to be recognized as a profession instead of a volunteer service. It is also reasonable to assume there is another contributing factor to the reason why firefighting is not seen as a necessary expense, the fire service does not have a high educational profession to relate to the way law enforcement relates to the legal profession and the way EMS relates to the medical profession. Instead, the firefighter, the fire officer, and the fire service are described as using outdated and reactive recommendations that are not standards to what the roles of each are. The fire officer is the most appropriate to assume the role of the emergency manager and maybe the emergency management profession can serve the fire PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 15 services as its higher educations the way law enforcement and EMS has justified themselves as professions by relating to a higher education profession. Dr. Burton A. Clark (1993) stated, “We have been training-oriented, from the bottom up, with an experiential/consensus base. What we need to become is education-oriented, from the top-down, with a research and science knowledge base” (Pg. 51). The fire service must encourage and promote a national educational standard that not only relies upon training but also depends on associates, bachelor’s, master’s, and doctorate degree programs from accredited educational institutions.

PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTER 16

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