Ideas for Ambulance (EMT) recruitment drive?

Try to discover why people leave. Recruitment is one thing, but retention is critical.

Are people unfullfilled by the work?

Stressed by expectations placed on them?

Schedule is too demanding?

How about the workplace environment?

Is the location somewhere that people want to spend time?

Comfortable furniture, TV, proper head and air conditioning, access to food and drink, clean bathrooms?

If the building isn't a nice place, nobody's gonna want to stay there.

Training oportunities are important, too. The nature of volunteer EMS is that amateurs are doing high-stress work that takes YEARS of high-volume experience to get any good at. Feeling like you're on your own can make it overwhelming. You have to make sure there are frequent, low-stress continuing ed oportunities especially with good teachers; outsource where you can.

The VAC I started in had a vending machine full of soda in the garage. The price was set to 5cents and there was a jar of nickles next to it. Soda was fee for the taking for everybody. It's not much, but it makes it more pleasant to be there and I think it's important.

Generally, I don't think financial incentives will draw the right kind of people. Tax credits, etc will only bring in those who have no passion for the work and they'll burn out super fast.

What does seem to help, with recruitment, is having a service with is visble in the community and percieved well. Public outreach, such as presentations at local schools about EMS, being present at HS football games, doing free blood-pressure checks, etc all reflect well on the organization. You want people who might be interested to see your equipment and personnel and automatically think, "they look like a nice bunch of people".