Firefighters across the state look to KU for mobile service training

This story originally appeared in its entirety in the January issue of Kansas Alumni magazine.

LAWRENCE -- From large city departments to rural volunteer stations, Kansas firefighters are seeking training through the University of Kansas Fire Service Training program.

Funding deficits have put fire departments across the state in a precarious position as safety becomes a hot-button issue and training needs expand.

Using a fleet of mobile props to simulate car fires, fuel spills, airplane crashes, building fires and propane explosions, KU Fire Service Training conducted hands-on classes in 96 Kansas counties last year.

The University of Kansas Continuing Education program reached clients from 28 states and one Canadian province through a contract to train U.S. Army firefighters at Fort Riley and via its annual conference on terrorism.

Fire Service Training also serves the state's community colleges, testing and certifying fire science students in Hutchinson, Johnson County and Kansas City.

But the primary students for the program's classes, conferences and field training exercises are the nearly 16,000 paid and volunteer firefighters at 673 fire departments across Kansas.

"The spectrum of what we can deliver runs from the basic skills you need the first day you walk on the job at the fire department, all the way through how to be a company officer in charge of a crew or an engine company," said Glenn Pribbenow, a former firefighter who now directs Fire Service Training. "We serve everybody from rookies to chiefs."

Fire Service Training started in 1949 when the Legislature called on KU to start a "traveling instruction service" to help train firefighters and boost fire protection across the state. The emphasis was -- and is -- on portability.

JoAnn Smith, dean of continuing education, has been troubled by the low level of funding for Fire Service Training. Last year, the program received $250,000 in state money -- only about $16 per Kansas firefighter.

"If they are willing to put their lives on the line, we owe it to them to train them with the best techniques" Smith said. "It's the right thing to do. It's a debt we need to clear to these people who serve the state."

Smith and Pribbenow said the program has had no budget increase in 16 years and has in fact lost money to state budget recisions. With the budget again in crisis, more cuts are likely this year.

With state funding limited, Fire Service Training must raise a big chunk of its budget -- about $150,000 last year -- from those who use its services. The small, mostly volunteer departments have a tough time affording the training.

Some funding relief has come from two federal grants. A Federal Emergency Management Agency grant, now in its fourth year, provides $80,000 for anti-terrorism programs, and a National Fire Academy grant for $30,000 allows the program to offer NFA classes at no cost to firefighters.

But while the grants have boosted class offerings by one-third, purchased much-needed classroom equipment and underwritten the annual conference on terrorism, they also have increased the workload of an already overburdened staff. More important, the grants don't address the shortage of basic firefighter training.

Hoping to end the chronic funding crisis, representatives of the state's fire have proposed a bill in the Kansas Senate to promote funding for fire services in the state.

"Everybody's minds and hearts are with us," Pribbenow said. "Whether their pocketbooks can afford it or not is another issue."