Laws to protect CAP's Emergency Services Volunteers

[lostdude1664]

Are there any laws to protect Civil Air Patrol's Emergency Services Volunteers from getting fired from their jobs when they get called out and/or are in training? Because I know that Volunteer firefighters and Volunteer EMTs have laws to protect them from getting fired from their jobs when they get called out to assist their community.

[Al Sayre]

Yes, but the coverage varies from state to state. Check with your Wing Legal Officer, he/she should be up on any laws relating to CAP.

[capmaj]

You can also check with the Wing Government Relations Adviser. That person can get the ball rolling in the event that your State doesn't yet have a 'Leave' type Bill on the books.

[PHall]

First thing you need to do is talk to your Boss.

[Mitchell 1969]

First thing you need to do is talk to your Boss.

Indeed. Working pays the bills and volunteering happens on your time, not work time. I've seen guys lose jobs because they didn't understand that bosses hired them to be there and not volunteering elsewhere.

[TheSkyHornet]

Missed this thread, eh
http://captalk.net/index.php?topic=20327.0



Like said before, it varies state-to-state. Not everyone sees CAP as a reasonable excuse to get out of work, mostly because the officials making those laws aren't in the complete awareness or understanding of CAP's role

[Flying Pig]

Whats interesting is considering that CAP doesnt get ordered in.  They volunteer.  Even my LE agency had discretion on people who voluntarily accepted military orders vs those who were ordered involuntarily.  We had a deputy who volunteered to be a local recruiter.  He didnt lose his job, but he ended up living off of a Cpls pay after living in the lap of luxury from being a long time cop probability making $85K a year.    We even had stipulations on pre-9/11 vs people who enlisted after 9/11.   Pre-9/11 the agency made up the difference in your military pay vs your LEO pay.  So you were guaranteed an amount equal to your base LEO pay.   If you enlisted or RE-Enlisted after 9/11 or you got your 30 days and then the rest was on you.  So you could very easily go from being a decently paid cop to living off of E2 pay if you got activated.  So even leave rights for military members isnt all peaches and cream.  That situation is what got one of our cops fired that I spoke about before in the Illinois discussion.  He volunteered for a 6 month deployment that even kept him local and even home every night, but altered the documents to indicate he had been involuntarily ordered to active duty.  Someone found out.... and he got canned from the PD and booted from the Air Guard.  He was a TSgt with a load of years on too.  Pretty ugly deal.