Brooklyn Park Fire Department goes full-time, paves way for improved service

A metro fire department is starting a new chapter with goals of improving its service while instilling life-long firefighters.

The Brooklyn Park Fire Department will graduate the first round of cadets this week since transitioning into a full-time operation.

As a growing city, and seeing how trends have gone in the fire industry, the department’s fire chief said it’s a move that was needed as the ‘volunteer approach’ has been dwindling for years.

“You have duel income families, you have competing priorities outside of work,” Chief John Cunningham said about some of the hurdles to enlisting volunteer firefighters.

“To be honest, we’re also figuring out we need to practice what we preach,” Cunningham added. “We always say in the fire service and volunteering: your family comes first, your work comes second. We as a fire service may be third [or] fourth on that list.”

This week, eight cadets are finalizing their training. The six-month, full-time training was paid and, according to Chief Cunningham, has prepared them to be ready for work right away.

The switch to a full-time operation – the city currently has paid-on-call firefighters that it will move away from – attracted a lot of interest in recruiting firefighters. Nearly 400 people applied.

Not only will this help retain serious candidates for the full-time positions, but Cunningham hopes this will also help with their response times as all their staff will be ready to respond to calls.