BOISE — An act that would have created tax incentives for volunteer firefighters and EMS responders has been pushed off until the next legislative session, the bill’s supporters announced. 

While the bill was never formerly introduced to the Idaho Legislature, the group writing about the bill worked with District 1 Rep. Mark Sauter, R-Sandpoint, to refine the idea. Jason Sawin, a former firefighter in Colorado and head of the citizens committee behind the bill, said it was delayed due to issues with the state budget. 

“With everything going on at the Capitol and budgets being cut, it does have a real expense to it that would come out of the state budget,” Sawin said. "We felt like its odds of passing this session were low. Plus, if we get more buy in, more support, more ideas built into it from around the state, then there's more people going to promote it with their local representatives.” 

Sawin said cost to the state would be around $400,000 to $500,000, but that in a tight budget year they felt it was unrealistic to ask for any money. He has served as a volunteer for the Garden Valley Fire Department before and said he has had the idea for a tax break for a while. 

Sawin said he’s self-employed and during his volunteer days, leaving for a call meant losing out on potential revenue. In rural counties, like Garden Valley, even volunteering to drive an ambulance can take a significant chunk out of a volunteer’s day, Sawin said. 

Part of the push for volunteer incentives also had to do with the age of volunteers. Sawin said they are especially needed for younger people, who have a harder time getting time off and can take a larger hit financially when missing work. 

“Firefighting is a younger person's job,” Sawin said. "Especially rural communities, they might commute an hour away to work, and so they're not even here, during the weekdays, or something like that. And that's a whole other problem... So, any incentives you can give somebody to volunteer would be good.” 

Swain and the committee are based in Garden Valley, a rural community in southern Idaho, but he said these are issues that are plaguing fire departments statewide.  

In Bonner County, the rural fire department districts are facing a steep understaffing problem, according to Selkirk Fire Rescue and EMS Chief Jeff Armstrong. Chief Tim Nowak of EMSllc, who conducted a needs and feasibility assessment for Selkirk Fire Rescue and EMS, said at a March 23 meeting that he feels volunteer staffing is no longer a viable solution for departments. 

“In this part of the country, volunteerism is dead. I don’t believe it’s reliable for a number of factors,” Nowak said. “Even to maintain or have a volunteer presence within this department, 20 is a nice number, but 50 [volunteers] is what you probably need just to have even a viable presence of a volunteer response within this department. Anything less than that is probably just going to be negligible.”  

Sawin said the idea of implementing tax break incentives is gaining steam across the country as departments struggle to attract new volunteers. He said hopes that the incentives would bring more volunteers in and help departments maintain qualified people. 

“We are going to keep working as our citizens committee. We're not an official organization, we're not a nonprofit,” Sawin said. “We're going to continue working to find solutions for our local department, but also that can have a statewide impact as well.”