Left: Sheryl Braim, first ever full time firefighter with Sexsmith Fire Department (Photos: Supplied: Sexsmith Fire Department)

By Abby Zieverink

Sheryl Braim

Sexsmith Fire Department welcomes first-ever full-time firefighter

Mar 31, 2022 | 5:00 AM

The Town of Sexsmith has officially welcomed its first full-time firefighter to its fire department.

Mayor Kate Potter says the move to hire a full-time firefighter to the Sexsmith Fire Department is imperative to ensure all residents can count on reliable and consistent fire services in their community.

She explains that after looking at the potential impacts of not having a full-time firefighter, they realized this addition was the right move at the right time for the community.

“What we wanted was some consistency on the volunteer side of things, so this made sense that it’s helping address the availability of volunteers to have someone there full time during daytime hours,” said Potter.

“We often end up short during those hours because a lot of our residents and volunteers work full-time jobs in other communities or inside the county so having that resource right in the house was really important.”

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Since the Sexsmith Fire Department is volunteer-based, Potter tells EverythingGP they also wanted to ensure they were not overstretching their volunteer firefighters.

“We have been so blessed to have a fantastic volunteer base, but we know it’s becoming harder and harder as there’s a lot of expectation placed on volunteers,” she said.

“So relieving some of that (stress) will help provide good service (to the community) and maintain the volunteer base that we have.”

Potter says having a full-time firefighter will help guarantee residents have a quicker response time from the fire department.

“Our volunteers, of course, will still work very closely with the full-time firefighter, but it will improve our response. So instead of waiting for enough volunteers to send a truck out, we have somebody already there; and that means less wait time basically that people experience when they’re in a crisis or emergency.”

Potter explains that if a community does not have a quick enough response time, there is a concern that the community could be downgraded for its fire protection.

Which ultimately, could result in increased insurance premiums for residents.

“We weren’t there already where we were facing that, but we didn’t want to get there,” she explained.

“We want to make sure that as much as it depends on us, we are being proactive in maintaining a good fire service and that the expectation our residents have for fire services is maintained,” she added.

“That was a proactive move on our part because we wanted to make sure our residents are not getting increases on our insurance premiums, at a time when there are so many other increases when you think of inflation, fuel, groceries, like its across the board so anything we can do to help that we want to.”

Sheryl Braim accepted the full-time firefighter position with the Sexsmith Fire Department.

Potter says Braim has been with the local fire department as a volunteer for seven years and has quickly moved up the ranks at the department.

“A homegrown hero,” expressed Potter. “She (Braim) has great connections within our community so we are very pleased with her being named in that position and hired there and we are looking forward to a really great relationship with her moving forward as well.”