NCFPD approves full consolidation with Rainbow VFD

The Rainbow Volunteer Fire Department has been incorporated into the North County Fire Protection District's volunteer program.

A 5-0 NCFPD board vote March 27 approved a full consolidation of the Rainbow Volunteer Fire Department into the North County Fire Protection District.

"It's a new chapter in our organization's history," said NCFPD fire chief Steve Abbott.

The NCFPD encompasses 92 square miles in Fallbrook, Bonsall, and Rainbow. The district is the result of a 1986 merger between the former Fallbrook Fire Protection District, which was founded in 1930 and originally called the Fallbrook Local Fire Protection District, and County Service Area No. 7, which was founded in the 1960s and served Rainbow prior to the merger.

The annexation of Gavilan Mountain was also part of the 1986 reorganization. The Rainbow Volunteer Fire Department maintained its autonomy after the merger, although administrative matters had been handled by the NCFPD, and volunteers continued to staff the Rainbow fire station which became known as NCFPD Station 6.

"We consolidated on paper 32 years ago but we operated as two quasi-independent agencies," Abbott said.

Abbott noted that in 1986 the NCFPD did not have the personnel to provide adequate service to Rainbow. "The volunteers did a very good job of being able to staff the station and make the calls," he said.

State law now requires volunteer firefighters to have the same training career firefighters do. "That's quite a demand for some folks," Abbott said.

In 2008 the San Diego County Board of Supervisors and San Diego's Local Agency Formation Commission created the San Diego County Regional Fire Authority, and the initial phase included bringing territory not within the boundaries of a public agency but served by a volunteer fire department into the SDCRFA.

The volunteer fire departments retained their autonomy and began working together with the paid firefighters covering those areas. Those volunteer fire departments included the De Luz Volunteer Fire Department but not the Rainbow Volunteer Fire Department which was already within the NCFPD boundaries. The SDCRFA was later expanded to cover county service areas which provided fire protection and emergency medical services and which utilized volunteer firefighters.

The Board of Supervisors approved a fire master plan in July 2013, and one of the implementation elements included training and stipends for volunteer firefighters. The county-funded training provides volunteer firefighters with the same level of training professional firefighters have, so the biggest impact to the volunteer fire departments has been the loss of firefighters to full-time paid positions.

During the first nine months of the implementation 50 volunteer firefighters were hired as full-time personnel and 71 new volunteers were recruited for volunteer stations. Most of Rainbow's recent volunteer firefighters are not Rainbow residents and have been in the early stages of their professional firefighting careers, which changed the staffing of Station 6 from primarily local citizens to primarily interns.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency's U.S. Fire Administration has an Assistance to Firefighters Grants program which includes Staffing for Adequate Firefighting and Emergency Response (SAFER) grants. In 2016 the North County Fire Protection District applied for a SAFER grant to develop a volunteer firefighter recruitment and retention program. The district was awarded a $945,149 grant covering a four-year period.

The SAFER grant has two components. One of those allowed the district to create an administrative captain position and hire the captain whose activities include handling day-to-day administration of the volunteer program including recruitment, training coordination, record keeping, certification, testing, and evaluation. The other component provides education and equipment for the volunteer firefighters including certification which ensures that the volunteer firefighters can drive a fire engine or ambulance.

The funding from the SAFER grant also allowed the district to move a full-time captain/paramedic and a full-time engineer/paramedic to Station 6, so the current staffing consists of two full-time personnel along with one or more volunteer firefighters on most days. Advanced life support response in the Rainbow area now averages three minutes faster than when the station was staffed exclusively by volunteers.

The Rainbow Volunteer Fire Department had an advisory board which held monthly meetings and recent meetings included discussions on better integration of the volunteers into operations, better coordination of efforts, and ensuring consistent and reliable service to the Rainbow area.

Coverage of the Rainbow area had already been coordinated with other NCFPD resources and Rainbow's volunteer and professional firefighters were included in all daily training, prevention, and public outreach functions. The Rainbow volunteers and professional staff also provided backup coverage to other portions of the district. A non-voting discussion item at the Feb. 27 NCFPD board meeting provided favorable input on the proposed full consolidation.

The 1986 LAFCO conditions included that tax revenues generated from the Rainbow subzone of the consolidated area be used for the benefit of operations in the Rainbow area, and that will continue to be the case.

The merger reclassifies Rainbow's volunteer firefighters as NCFPD volunteers.

"It was very timely, but our hats certainly go off to their board and their chief and their volunteers," Abbott said.