BELFAST, Maine — Classic car collectors and first responders gathered in Belfast for the first Horsepower for Heroes Car and Bike Show on Saturday, August 26. The event, held at the Stanley Chevrolet dealership, aimed to raise money for the maintenance of Waldo County’s fire and first responder training center in the town of Waldo.
The event was also a chance for chiefs and captains of Waldo’s 13 all-volunteer fire departments to raise awareness about a different issue.
“Nobody’s getting younger,” Ken Clements, the chief of Monroe Fire Department, said Saturday. “We’re looking for some young blood, young people to do the heavy lifting.”
Though Clements and others in Waldo County are currently doing well staffing-wise, they said they do notice a difficulty in recruiting new volunteers. Part of the reason for that is training.
“Years ago when I started, it was on-the-job training," Clements said.
Those on the frontlines said times are different now, though.
“Fires themselves have changed,” David Smith, the acting fire chief in Unity, said. “Things have become much more complicated in terms of building construction when it comes to fire.”
This, in turn, has led to more cumbersome and time-consuming training to become a volunteer—leading many to pass up on the gig. If this trend continues, the aging corps of volunteer firefighters in Maine may not be replaced with an equally robust generation of new recruits.
As Lisa Gilespie of the Liberty Fire Department put it, “It was such a community thing to do, you just automatically got involved...and now, I think the culture has just changed where younger people aren't volunteering as much."