Just when I think I’ve got the whole Facebook thing figured out, it throws me a curveball. But rather than groan with knees buckled as the ball slip-slides past, this was a good curveball.
A news story came out early this week about efforts in Congress to alter the tax code to offer some relief to volunteer firefighters. Basically, it would allow volunteers to count their time donated similar to a financial contribution to a charity.
With Congress on the mound, it is anybody’s guess what pitch is coming next: whether the bill will pass and if so how much will it have changed since being introduced. Will it somehow be entangled in the “health care, immigration, pipeline, general disdain for one another” debate?
I believe the story to be important, but assumed it would be a sleeper on Facebook — it didn’t come with a kitten video. I was wrong, and happily so. It drew a great deal of attention and reaction.
That’s the good part of the curveball. It is good that Congress is having the discussion about volunteer fire service. It is better that the fire service sat up and took notice.
Once you identify the pitch as a curveball, you can begin to predict its trajectory. What became predictable here was the debate this story kicked off on whether or not volunteer firefighters should be compensated — it always comes up.
I understand that the most profound reward comes from giving — volunteering (here’s where I plug my work with the International Fire Relief Mission). Most volunteer firefighters understand that. I’m also fiercely in favor of compensation for volunteer firefighters as it helps recruit and retain, as well as assign tangible value to firefighters in the minds of administrators.
One commenter who opposes compensation did so on the grounds that it serves to attract the wrong kind of person to firefighting; those who come to it for profit not service to the community.
When I take a brutally honest look at myself, I see a mixed bag of all the reason to be a paid on call/volunteer — the good and the ugly. I suspect we all do. Perhaps doing it less for the adrenaline rush and self-important status and more for service to community is a natural maturing process.
That aside, with the ranks of volunteer and paid on call dwindling and municipal budgets not welcoming full-time career replacements, we need incentives beyond altruistic ones to keep our ranks up. It’s not ideal; it’s reality.
I urge all firefighters, career or otherwise, to step up to the plate and support this bill. We may not connect on this at bat, but the volunteer firefighters have earned it and deserve our best swing.
