PFLUGERVILLE, Texas — The Travis County Emergency Services Department in Pflugerville is seeing the most significant staffing shortage they have experienced in years.
“I've been doing this for like 25 years, and we've never run this far behind in staffing,” said Nick Perkins, the fire chief of Travis County ESD No. 2.
This low number of EMTs and firefighters comes as the number of people living in the area just keeps increasing.
Perkins said emergency response departments across the area are facing this challenge, which is one reason why they just launched their first-ever in-house firefighter and EMT certification program in January.
“We train you in both those positions and certifications and we pay you while you're doing it,” said Perkins. “It really just opens the door to a whole other level of people that we would never have had access to.”
This new program has led to the biggest applicant pool the department has ever seen and the most diverse class, which Perkins said is important for the department and the community.
“I think offering paid training just opens it up to a group of folks that face barriers, quite honestly, getting into this career field,” said Perkins. “We've taken those away.”
Getting these new responders hired is crucial because they are supposed to have 160 responders on staff, and right now they only have 130.
But, in just a couple of months, that number will increase as they graduate their first class of responders from their civilian academy. This first class started with 50 cadets and is now down to 40. They hope to see about 24 people from this class join the department in August when the class finishes. This will bring to the number of responders they should have on staff right now.
“In the meantime, we're running lean,” shared Perkins. “So that means that the existing firefighters are working overtime, they're having to work extra shifts to kind of fill those gaps until we can get enough folks caught up.”
They will start their second class in September or October and also plan to fund 30 to 40 more additional responder positions in the new budget year that starts in October.
So far, Perkins believes this strategy is working and is bringing in candidates who truly care about working hard to serve the people in the Pflugerville area.
“You're getting someone that I think appreciates that you've invested in them and are hopefully going to turn around and invest back in the organization and in the community,” said Perkins.
Perkins said people should know that the majority of the calls they respond to are medical calls, so think of yourself as a medical provider who also responds to fires.
Applications for their next class, which starts in September and October, are still open.
You can learn more here.
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