All members, please read the following note from the president of the Connecticut State Firefighters Association:

Ted Schroll and Leon Collins attended a meeting of the firefighter’s cancer working group on January 27, 2016. It has been discussed that only firefighters who are CURRENTLY CERTIFIED as interior firefighters (both career and volunteers) will be eligible for this benefit if the legislation is passed. The Connecticut State Firefighters Association has been tasked with obtaining the number of volunteer firefighters who are CURRENTLY CERTIFIED as interior firefighters. The chairperson is referring to the Required Minimum standard OSHA 1910.156(c) (2) standard which requires training “at least quarterly”. It is believed by most that once a firefighter has been certified continued education is not required. If a member does not participate in training drills “at least quarterly” that does not mean that they have maintained their certification.

We are seeking your assistance in this endeavor. All of you have helped in the past, and we are calling again. We cannot possibly make calls to all 300+ fire companies in the State of Connecticut. We are also asking those of you who are Chief’s, Training Officers, or hold an administrative office please forward the number of firefighters certified as interior firefighters in your department, not a full training record.

If you are a member of of any fire service associations (CT Chiefs, Career Chiefs, CFDIA, CFMA, etc.) please forward this email so they can pass it along to their association email distribution lists.

The information needed is what you would provide to OSHA if it was requested. Remember, we only need the number of firefighters certified as interior firefighters, not a full training record.

Once you have that information email it to Leon Collins at collins@csfa.org. Leon will compile the information on a spreadsheet.

Please understand that this request is time sensitive, the legislative session starts Wednesday February 3, 2016. We need your co-operation ASAP. Be as accurate as you can. Since we do not know how these numbers will be interpreted, either over counting or under counting is not suggested; just accurate numbers. We DO know that the numbers will be used to determine extent of coverage. One statement that was made to us was that failure to provide any information would quite probably result in disallowing the entire benefit for volunteer firefighters.
Sincerely,

Vaughan I. Dumas
President, CSFA

CSFA Online 2016