The era of using volunteer firefighters as the front line in Julian may be coming to an end.
In February, the Julian-Cuyamaca Fire Prevention District board voted 3 to 2 to dissolve the volunteer fire force that had been serving the community since the 1980s.
Aida Tucker is the vice president of the JCFPD board and voted to dissolve the department.
"I looked at the budget and saw that there’s no way we were going to be able to make it in the next couple years. We probably would be broke by then without any extra help, so thinking about the community and what they deserve, I decided to go ahead and vote to dissolve the district," she said.
Because of staffing and response problems, Julian's Fire Prevention Board asked the San Diego County Fire Authority for help in 2015. It entered into a two-year contract and the county gave the area extra resources and $105,000 in subsidies and services.