Northside Volunteer Fire Department has been granted full service designation by the office of the BC fire commissioner.
Jim Brown, fire chief, Northside Volunteer Fire Department (NVFD) said the department has moved to full service, due to certifications of six of the department’s firefighters.
“That covers the whole spectrum of where we have to be for the playbook,” said Brown, referring to the British Columbia structure firefighter competency and training playbook, which provides guidelines for the designations. “For training, we had to go with the Justice Institute of British Columbia. We have enough people now that meet the standard so that’s pretty good.”
He said the fire department attained the full-service designation in September.
According to Brown, full service is a designation, which is the highest rating the fire commissioner’s office grants related to how a department can respond to fires.
“Our firefighters have really taken to their training,” said Brown. “When we thought of this it was pretty daunting to do. They have all risen to the occasion and they are just a fantastic bunch of people.”
In order to help the firefighters achieve a higher level of certification, NVFD brought in the fire training trailer from the justice institute in February and that brought a bunch of people forward for that training.
Brown said extensive training is an ongoing feature of the volunteer fire department. NVFD trains every Wednesday night. The evening begins with a first responder program, which is an hour a week, and then there is a two-hour training session. Firefighters also train on weekends.
“It takes up a lot of time,” said Brown.
There are 28 firefighters in NVFD.
“It’s great for this area because we have a pretty small population,” said Brown.
NVFD’s fire protection service area includes properties from just north of the village of Lund, south to Wilde Road, and includes properties on the west side of Okeover Inlet as far north as Penrose Bay. NVFD provides its services to the Klahanie and Southview lease lands through agreement with Tla’amin Nation.
“It’s a substantial area,” said Brown.
The fire chief said the volunteer firefighters have risen to the occasion and they are a busy group.
“There’s a real commitment,” said Brown.
Ryan Thoms, manager of emergency service for qathet Regional District (qRD), said in 2016 the qRD board endorsed a policy of declaring the training levels for each of the local fire services that it has established.
“Using the BC fire commissioner’s training manual, the board declared both its Northside and Malaspina Volunteer Fire Departments would train toward the fire commissioner’s definition of full service fire training competencies,” said Thoms. “The full service training commitment takes hundreds of hours of classroom and hands-on training. Our volunteer firefighters are attending regular training and practice sessions at least once per week and often attend special training sessions on weekends. The result is better trained firefighters who are better able to serve the community.”
Thoms said on top of this training, NVFD also successfully accomplished superior tanker shuttle service accreditation in 2017.
“This improves firefighting capabilities and offers improved insurance premiums for property owners within the NVFD service area,” said Thoms. “This accreditation also was the result of many hours of dedication to training and equipment within the NVFD.”
