The biggest challenge Rich Kindelan faces as Scarborough’s new fire chief is staffing, he says.
A career in firefighting has “become a little less glamorous because of the transition to mostly emergency medical service calls,” said Kindelan, who most recently was the department’s deputy chief of EMS. “We don’t go to fires every day anymore.”
Scarborough responded to 1,307 fire calls and 3,360 EMS calls in 2021. Fire calls are considered “anything that does not require patient care,” according to Kindelan, including responding to alarms, smells and car crashes without injuries.
For about the past 10 years, the department has been trying to shift from a heavy reliance on volunteer call members to full time staffing, said Town Manager Tom Hall. That’s not always easy when there’s a shortage of applicants.