New provisions insure volunteer personnel

Offering accident protection to volunteer firefighters and emergency rescue workers can mean the difference between having a reliable roster of trained personnel or having to constantly recruit new members.

But providing these benefits has not been easy for cities and counties. Because volunteers are not on municipal payrolls, often they are not protected by workers’ compensation if they are injured in the line of duty.

In the past, city risk managers have had to piece together bits of private medical and disability plans for their volunteer emergency workers. The most comprehensive programs will provide disability insurance; indemnity for loss of life, limb, sight or hearing and payment of medical care expenses for on-the-job injuries and specified diseases. The best are designed as a menu of options, allowing risk managers to choose only the benefits they need.

Some counties have found that a private specialty package makes sense, even when volunteer emergency workers are covered by workers’ compensation. Officials in Roanoke County, Va., depend on their 600 volunteers to assist paid emergency staff during daylight hours and, they comprise the entire staff in the evenings and on weekends. In the early ’80s, county officials in Roanoke began investigating options for volunteer emergency worker coverage.

Although Virginia state law permitted volunteer coverage under programs other than workers’ compensation, government officials felt the state program offered the best options at that time.

The Board of Supervisors for the county passed a resolution declaring that the volunteers would be classified as paid workers to allow them eligibility for workers’ compensation.

A few years later, Bob Jernigan, risk manager for the county, was assigned the task of restructuring the county’s system for volunteer coverage. Workers’ compensation was not providing the level of protection the government wanted to provide, particularly in disability cases.

“Since the volunteers were not on payroll, the workers’ compensation program assigned the minimum wage as their salary — not that of their real livelihood — in order to calculate disability benefits,” Jernigan says. “We called it the ‘$120-and-change’ program, because that was the weekly benefit from the state.”

Additionally, with doctors and other professionals on the volunteer roster, a higher level of coverage was necessary. Officials looked for a program that would supplement but not duplicate the disability benefits already provided through workers’ compensation.

“Most of the insurance companies only offered a package deal,” Jernigan says. But ITT Hartford offered the county a benefits package that would add $300 per week disability coverage per volunteer at an affordable cost. The program has been so successful the county has added a life insurance benefit and a retirement plan to the package.

“We’ve found the benefits we now offer make an excellent recruitment and retention tool,” Jernigan says. “In the past, companies would pay their employees their salary if they got hurt volunteering. Now with downsizing, they’re less willing to help them financially. It’s important for us to offer incentives to keep our volunteers and protect them. We appreciate the job they do.”