DOVER, Del. Paid firefighters could soon join the city's ranks.
Dover City Council authorized the Dover Fire Department to seek federal funding to pay for those positions Monday night.
While Dover is the only capital city in the nation that currently has an all volunteer fire service, volunteers have been hard to come by lately.
Now, the department said it needs at least a few paid firefighters to keep things running and that's raising questions about the future.
Dover Fire Chief David Carey said he plans to apply for a SAFER grant in the coming months. It would pay five full-time firefighters, enough to have someone on duty 24/7.
"The grant is normally good for three to four years and it covers salaries, pensions and health benefits," he explained. "But, at the end of the grant's term someone would be need to take over funding those positions or [the paid firefighters] would be laid off."
That possible scenario has raised some concerns from Dover neighbors. City Councilman Brian Lewis brought the issue up at Monday night's meeting.
"If it's Dover's intention in the future to become a paid fire department [community members] would like to at least get some advanced notice because it would have a severely high increase on our property taxes," Lewis said, addressing Chief Carey.
Carey said an entire department of full-time staff is not the goal and that over the next few years, the city will hopefully find ways to continue paying new hires' possible salaries.
"The last thing I want to do is hire career firemen," Carey mentioned. "But I also understand that we need to take a proactive role."
Norman "Jay" Jones with Delaware's Volunteer Firefighters Association said it could be Dover's only option to keep the community safe.
"There are pros and cons in everything," Jones said. "It is just about learning how to fulfill the need that best serves the public and to move forward through growth and innovation there are steps like this that have to be taken."
Combining paid staff with volunteers is common across Delaware and Jones said it's happening more often as volunteers become harder to find.
Dover Fire Department plans to launch a volunteer recruitment campaign in the near future.
