firefighters

The Ohio Newsroom has been working on a year-long investigation into volunteer firefighting departments in the state.

The majority of Ohio's volunteer fire departments are staffed by volunteers. While the number of volunteers is decreasing, the number of calls those departments have to respond to is increasing.

Ohio’s volunteer firefighting system depends on the sacrifice of aging, underpaid and overworked Ohioans who serve their communities out of pride.

When many Ohioans call 911, the people who show up to help in their darkest hours are volunteers, armed with as little as 36 hours of training and often tasked with fighting bigger fires with fewer people than career departments.

Ohio volunteer fire departments are funded through local levies. That forces small rural communities to rely on shoestring budgets to keep their communities safe.

With increased service calls, decreased recruitment and higher fatalities than the rest of the country, Ohio officials are sounding the alarm on the volunteer firefighter crisis.

Workers are still striking against Dublin-based fire truck manufacturer Sutphen. When council approved buying the vehicle, it stipulated it would cancel the contract if the union dispute wasn't resolved.

The Sutphen union dispute has engulfed the company since October. Since then, workers have been working without a contract as negotiations have come to a halt.

The 5-to-4 vote was split with council members Rob Dorans, Lourdes Barroso de Padilla, Melissa Green, Otto Beatty III and Nancy Day-Achauer voting against the purchase. Council President Shannon Hardin voted for the purchase alongside council members Emmanuel Remy, Christopher Wyche and Nick Bankston.

The foam many Ohio fire departments use to put out flames is laced with cancer-causing PFAS chemicals. Now, a new alternative is on the market.