Volunteer Fire Department Payout

[Terror Girl]

Does anyone have a volunteer fire department on standby at their haunt? If so how do you compensate them? Most of the locals I have talked with are giving them $50-100 per night and free tickets for the entire department.

[soultrkr]

They setup and take donations for parking at Haunted Hollow.

[Capt.Chaos]

Most Vol.Fire Depts. are ALWAYS looking for a new way to help fund there honorable cause. I would offer a donation to the dept. or the vol. depts. association. Depending on ypur area they may be differant. Dont give the money to the city make sure it is a donation to the volunteers. I would make an appointment to visit with the members( they usually meet once a month) and have your ideas all mapped out. They may have some EMT's which could do standby on your event nights. This will probably help in your insurance costs.
Hope that helps.

[N2SPOOKINU]

We use the fire dept for our security officers. We pay them an hourly rate. This is a benefit to us because they are on the premises for security. They monitor and direct parking for our customers. They are very familiar with the inside of the haunt and can get where we need them quickly be knowing the secret passages. They monitor our security cameras and have contact with the fire department just down the road with a push of a radio button. Not to mention EMT capabilities.
They are worth their weight in gold and I thank them for their service to our haunt.
I cant say enough about the benefits of having them there. The fire marshal feels more comfortable knowing they are on the premises and I know if there ever was an emergency they would be more than willing and capable to take care of it.
I recommend this idea to all haunts. IT WORKS!
Greg
Fearfest

[Terror Girl]

WOW.. I need a new VFD! Last year our Fire Marshal asked us to get a VFD to bring a brush truck out while we are open and we could make a donation to them. I am fine with that... When I contacted the VFD they said it would be $3,000.00 to come out. I almost passed out! That worked out to about $200 a night and still had to pay them even if we were closed because of weather- during the weeknights we are only open 2 hours - I then called another VFD and they agreed to come out for $100 a night - they got a phone call from the first VFD - not sure what was said but the second VFD called me back to say they wouldn't cover us because they would not get involved in the politics - WFT - Who knew there were VFD Politics? Needless to say before the end of the season last year.... it was UGLY!! I don't mind paying them but I am not going to be FORCED nor pushed around by them. Anyone have any suggestions?

[soultrkr]

that sounds alot lot racketeering to be honest unless you are using Pyro in the haunt.

[Capt.Chaos]

I started my career as a Volunteer before I got hired by a large Full time dept. Let me tell you, vol. depts. have insane amounts of politics!!! I would not have believed it either before I got involved in it 15 years ago. Its the same all over the country.
Since I dont know your area or response areas here are some ideas. Make sure you keep the marshall happy. I dont know why you need a brush truck on site unless maybe if your attraction is in a tent. If the depts. cant get along maybe bypass them. What I am saying is if you know a few vol. firefighters, go to them. Have your staff all take extinguisher training and hire a few vol. to be on staff. They are trained( I am assuming ) and fire proof your tent. Have all this in place before you talk to the marshall. If you show all the things you have in place, you may be able to get rid of that $3000 brush truck. Make sure your event is safe, but there is more then one way to work with these guy's. Trust me.

[Terror Girl]

VFD Help!

We are not in a tent.... we have a 120 year old grist mill (it doesn't have a sprinkler system is why they want a brush truck on site) We always make our fire marshall happy!! (this will be our 10th year) Last year he decided he wanted one ... we tried to work with both of our locals and had the Fire Marshall working between us and them... it got so bad the fire marshall asked us to try and get a VFD from another county!! The only way we operated last year was to pull everything outside... it sucked! I am going to try and get a few of the other local (but in different counties) haunts to give me something in writing on how they work/pay the local VFD to see if that helps... if anyone has any other suggestions I would really appreciate it.... I need all of the help I can get! This is going to be a long hard battle to win... but I WILL WIN! :lol: