Well I'm going to tell you what some of the of the problems are.. some of these small volunteer fire departments are being run like mofia crime families by not letting anyone other than their family join. That way they always get it their way. Where I live I see local fire departments being run lime that pushing away Good, Honest, and TRAINED people.i am one of those. I am a Pennsylvania state certified Firefighter 1 & 2 , I am also a Pennsylvania state certified Emt-Paramedic and the local department doesn't want me or 2 others that are certified and trained to join. Personally I think that some of these members and especially the chief feel threatened by people that have more training then him.. I can name at least 6 departments just in my area were the line officers and especially the chief is NOT trained or certified on anything. They might not even basic firefighter training. But their whole family is running the departments. Not to mention all the money that keeps coming up missing in some of these vfd s. I think that their general fund should be audited yearly just like the fema grant money. Even know that I have seen fraud personally being done with the grant money. Bottom line is that most of the volunteer fire departments in Pennsylvania are totally out of hand doing whatever they want because they know that there is NO acountabillity and that they don't have to answer to anyone. And that there are NO training requirements so they are doing whatever they want.

Wow.