Hall County Fire Services has a different kind of first responder on the team.
The chaplain program gives first responders an opportunity to turn to someone on both a professional and personal level, as well as engaging the first responders with the community.
The program has been in place for several years but was recently revamped about three years ago, according to Fire Chief Jeff Hood.
"There's always been a need for it and I've seen it where it's successful a lot of times when our personnel don't feel comfortable talking to each other or supervisors about certain things professionally or personally," said Hood. "A lot of times they're more willing to open up to the chaplains. You have to build that trust and we've done that. I know they feel comfortable talking to the chaplains. As far as a specific incident [to revamp the program] we don't have one, but on a day to day basis, our personnel see things most people can't even imagine. From time to time, that wears on you."
Deputy Chief Chaplain Darryl Womack serves as Senior Pastor at Montgomery Memorial Baptist Church in Gainesville and has been serving with the program for the past three years.
"What we've done is make purposeful moves to get in to the firehouses with things such as connecting the firehouses to the community," said Womack. One of the biggest things is having local churches adopt a firehouse, where once a month the church brings necessities to the firefighters. "A lot of people don't understand is while they're there, they have to eat, they have to divvy up the responsibility for purchasing the items that they eat.
"We want to try and make that a little easier for them, so the churches are actually getting together goodie bags for them each month with things like flour, sugar and salt, so they don't have to go out and purchase that. It makes a good impact an allows them to see people in the community, because most of the time... they only see them under tough situations, maybe a wreck of a house is burned."
Womack said the chaplains also visit the firehouses, talk to the first responders either in person of by phone, and even go on ride-alongs to calls to see what first responders are seeing.
And, the program is looking to expand, adding to their six chaplains and making the experience more personal, as well as undergoing further training, like critical incident training that allows the chaplains to better understand the tough calls.
Womack and Hood were featured on the Afternoon News Wrap with Russell Brown. Listen to their full interview above.
