“This reorganization had to be carried out”says Dominique Rose, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Calvados Fire and Rescue Service. A need for relays on the ground with the heads of rescue centers. From now on, a new territorial division is in place in three zones: Bayeux for the North-West group, Lisieux for the East group and Thury-Harcourt for the South-West group. The stated objective is to relieve, thanks to the support of the SDIS management, the managers of centers of a certain number of administrative tasks. This concerns as much the ordering of sanitary or other products or the organization of training for their firefighters. “A reorganization thought out in advance with the heads of centers who told us about their problems in the field“, specifies the general controller and director of SDIS Calvados, Christophe Auvray.
The SDIS management confirms this: “The problems of the Lisieux emergency center, for example, are not those of Vire. We have 46 centers, each with its own needs, and this new organization should help relieve the burden on the managers who are responsible for them.”
Decentralization for greater proximity and a strengthening of the number of volunteers
Volunteers now represent 80% of the French firefighter workforce.. In Calvados, the Departmental Fire and Rescue Service has 1,700 volunteers for 412 professionals. And one of the challenges for the departmental service is to develop volunteering, to encourage even more vocations to perpetuate and retain its workforce. To do this, it is necessary to go into the field to talk about the profession, meet public and private professionals, but also employees or young people who could get involved. Today, the SDIS has signed an agreement with 254 employers (public/private) and aims to set up “an employer label”. A kind of recognition of companies committed to freeing up and making available their volunteer employees for training or to intervene in the field.
The Multi-Year Investment Plan of the SDIS of Calvados must also result in the rehabilitation or construction of rescue centers. Several projects will start. We will remember in particular the large-scale project that has caused a stir, the construction of the third fire station in the agglomeration.
After Caen-Couvrechef and Ifs a third barracks in Bretteville-sur-Odon
Discussions regarding the location of a third fire station to cover the South-West of Caen have finally come to a conclusion. It will be built in Bretteville-sur-Odon in the Koenig district. Studies are underway, work will begin in May 2025 for delivery in the summer of 2026.
