Local fire chiefs say they’re struggling to meet demand with low staff, tight budgets

The snow was just starting to pick up in Loudon as Tom Blanchette walked into The Eggshell restaurant after a long night of service calls. The waitress brought him a steaming mug of coffee, which he dosed with cream and sugar as he greeted the other fire chiefs and captains at his table.

Not five minutes had passed before the radio in his pocket emitted a high-pitched tone. He groaned.

“That you, Tommy?” one member of the group asked.

“Not it,” another joked.

A Loudon resident had smelled gas in their home, and as chief, it was Blanchette’s job to go check on it. As he left, the others continued business as usual at their monthly breakfast meeting, where they discuss everything from new technology to town budgets to issues they face on the job.

Lately, the conversation has revolved around one topic in particular: staffing.

Unlike career departments that are typically found in cities and larger population areas, most of small-town New Hampshire fire departments operate on a part-time or volunteer basis. Some are a combination: In the capital area, many employ a chief and one or two full-time firefighters, then rely heavily on per diem responders and other towns’ departments for support.

Fifty years ago, Concord and 23 surrounding towns formed the Capital Area Mutual Aid Fire Compact. Currently led by chief coordinator Keith Gilbert, the towns work together to fill staffing gaps. For example, if Loudon gets sent out on a call, its neighbors in Canterbury may cover Loudon’s fire station as back-up while they’re busy, a practice often referred to as “mutual aid.” At larger incidents, it’s common for firefighters from a dozen nearby towns to assist either at the station or on the scene.

Canterbury’s fire chief, Michael Gamache, works part-time after retiring from 37 years at the Manchester Fire Department. The switch took him from a staff of 200 to a town of roughly 2,000.

“There was no problem. It was us, and if we had something big, we called the suburb stations to basically cover our station, occasionally to come to the scene,” Gamache said. “180-degree [turn] in coming to Canterbury. Now, it’s just me and whoever shows up.”

The back-up isn’t guaranteed, however, and it isn’t always timely. Sometimes, it can take 20 minutes for firefighters to come help from several towns over, leaving some short-handed.

“You’re stuck,” said Ben Arey, a fire captain in Northwood. “You’ve got to do a size-up, you’ve got to do stuff like that, but at one point you’re sitting there watching the building burn. What are you going to do, you know? You don’t have enough people to be able to do anything. You do what you can, but you’ll look kind of foolish there.”

National standards dictate that when firefighters arrive on the scene, two should head inside and assist each other, while two others should stay outside the building to monitor them and initiate rescue or call for back-up if needed.

“Before you even step in the building, you’re supposed to have four guys,” said Gilbert, from the Mutual Aid Compact. “That’s not happening.”

It wasn’t always like this, Arey said. About a decade ago, he recalled, people used to clamor for a seat on the truck. Some departments had waitlists to join. Now, he’s relieved because this coming week will be the first time in about six months he will have a fully staffed shift schedule.

Zooming out

Aspiring firefighters are trained at the New Hampshire Fire Academy, where they must complete two certifications to join the service. Mark Wholey, director of the fire academy, said it has the capacity to train and certify more than 200 first responders each year.

Someone can become a firefighter in as little as 10 weeks if they take the courses concurrently, which Wholey said is popular among most of the younger applicants who are targeting the fire service as a career. Others who may be older with families or making a career switch tend to opt for a nights-and-weekends schedule, which takes about six months to finish.

Wholey said he’s taking a two-pronged approach to filling the workforce through the fire academy — one of career firefighters and one of volunteers. Those who work part-time or volunteer aren’t legally required to have any certification, but they aren’t eligible for full-time employment unless they’re certified in both Firefighter I and Firefighter II courses.

Though local departments are struggling to find and keep their staff, the state has one thousand more licensed career firefighters than 10 years ago, according to data from the state’s Department of Safety. In 2025, 3,089 individuals held state-issued Firefighter II certifications, though a department spokesperson said that doesn’t mean they are actively working or living in New Hampshire.

Most of the academy’s classes are full, Wholey said, though 10-15% of those who start the academy don’t finish. Some people aren’t mentally or physically prepared for the reality of the profession, which he said involves understanding the science behind a blaze, how to fight different types of fires, and learning to respond to traumatic scenes.

“You might think that firefighting is the red firetruck going down the street. Get off, go get a hose and squirt water to put the fire out,” Wholey said. “The truth of the matter is, you’re starting a journey that is incredibly dynamic and incredibly challenging.”

On the flip side, firefighters often retire early or change careers. The job can be draining emotionally and mentally, and firefighters face high cancer risks due to carcinogenic chemicals in their protective gear. Because of those risks, the state’s pension system also allows firefighters to retire with full benefits as early as age 52.5 after 25 years of service.

John McAllister, secretary-treasurer of the Professional Fire Fighters of New Hampshire union, said modifications to the pension formula about 15 years ago, combined with the career risks, were a turnoff for some people.

“I think that some of the younger generation is looking at this and saying, ‘Is this a profession I really want to get into?’” McAllister said.

When fire departments do get trainees or newly certified firefighters, Arey said, the existing firefighters have less institutional knowledge to share.

“Either they’re aging out, retiring, moving on, whatever, so anytime you get somebody that can actually start to train new people, the old ones are gone and they’re not being trained as good,” Arey said. “I think we’ve lost a lot of that over the years.”

Local pressures

Aside from workforce trends, volunteer and part-time departments struggle to attract and retain experienced firefighters.

In much of New Hampshire, taxpayers are either unwilling or unable to handle ever-increasing property taxes. Still, the fire chiefs said that no matter how restricted their budgets become, they’re charged with finding a way to respond quickly and efficiently when every second matters.

Several said they sympathize with taxpayers’ concerns. At the same time, their expectation for the level of service they want doesn’t always match the level of service they’re willing to pay for in the town budget.

“We’re struggling to meet the demand for service with the right equipment to deliver that service, and we all realize that the money is coming out of the same people’s wallets,” Blanchette said.

Some of the chiefs also lamented the struggle of getting new equipment that they feel would better serve the town and attract more hires. Blanchette asked voters to approve a $1.7 million bond for a new aerial ladder firetruck last year and received a resounding “no.”

Residents were “voting our wallets,” as one put it last year, and aiming to save as much money as possible. This year, they’ll vote on drawing $600,000 from a reserve fund to buy a used ladder truck.

Loudon isn’t alone in its penny-pinching. Northwood has operated on a default budget for years, and Chichester Chief Tim Robinson said he has no full-time staff. The town uses a paid-on-call system and mutual aid.

It’s cheaper — the town doesn’t have to pay benefits — but turnout can be unreliable.

“Currently, that’s acceptable to the people of town,” Robinson said, but when a town leans on mutual aid, “you’re relying on the taxpayers from different communities to take care of your call, and that’s not right.”

Mutual aid allows towns to work together, but they also have to compete.

In Loudon, which is a combination department, Blanchette said he hopes to increase the pay range for his more experienced full-time staff up to $28 an hour if voters approve the proposed budget at town meeting. At the same time, he just got wind that a nearby town has raised its starting wage to $28, which is likely to attract more people.

Towns with higher wages, newer equipment and bigger staffs tend to win out, Blanchette said. Over the past few years, Loudon has lost three people to Franklin, three to Belmont, three to Concord, two to Hooksett and one each to Exeter and Farmington.

At the Loudon fire station is a board with tiny gold plaques, where members who stay past five years, past 10 years, past 15 and 20 get their names engraved. It’s been maintained since 1997 and is less than half-full.

Only 18 have stayed past five years. Not many are still with the department.

When Blanchette sees it, he thinks about all the things that can drive someone away from the profession — the intense emotional pressure, the physical toll, the life moments missed.

“The mental burden of doing this job, eventually, you sit down one day and say, ‘OK. I wake up every night at 2:30 in the morning and see ghosts,’” he said. “‘I’ve missed my grandkids’ birthdays, I missed Christmas morning, I had to get up in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner, and my wallet is no thicker … Is this worth it?’”

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