Cancer and suicide are the leading causes of death for firefighters nationwide so we prioritize the health and well-being of our local volunteer firefighters by offering integrative wellness clinics and mental health resiliency trainings, installing saunas in firehouses, and running ground-breaking 16-week firefighter detoxification protocols to reduce their carcinogenic chemical levels.

The recruitment of new volunteer firefighters is critical to building resilience into our local communities. Currently, half of all Sonoma County firefighters are volunteers – a number that has dropped nearly ten percent in the last three years. Huge swaths of Sonoma County rely on volunteer firefighters for everyday emergency response and when large-scale disaster strikes (as it has all too often in recent years), volunteers provide a critical staffing surge for county-wide response. In 2024, VFF will launch Sonoma County’s first large-scale volunteer firefighter recruitment campaign.

Highly-trained volunteer firefighters are not only able to offer superior service to their community but are also more likely to stay engaged and active in the fire service. In 2024, VFF will provide advanced training courses to hundreds of volunteers, including Driver/Operator certifications, Incident Command and Advanced Wildland trainings, and Firefighter academy scholarships.

Some firefighter needs are obvious – protective gear, for example. Others, much less so. Part of VFF’s mission is to identify and meet as many of these needs as possible, whether it’s by providing partial reimbursement for PPE, subsidizing expensive but necessary physical exams, or distributing strike team kits to ensure that volunteer firefighters who respond to major campaign fires have a set of supplies to cover their basic needs. Each of our strike team kits includes a portable cook system, nutritious dehydrated meals, instant coffee, body wipes, headlamps, and more.