Six years after cutting a paid on-call firefighter program, South Whidbey Fire/EMS commissioners this week agreed to bring it back.

In a 2-0 vote Thursday, commissioners Kenon Simmons and Mike Helland approved a recommendation to hire eight part-time employees to help improve the district’s day-time emergency response. Commissioner Bob Elliot was not present.

The part-time staff will consist of a captain, two lieutenants, five firefighters and emergency medical technicians. They will be hired June 1, fire officials said.

The district will spend $181,740 of its $2.57 million operating budget, which will be finalized for the district’s November meeting, to pay the part-time employees, according to budget documents.

The move to hire part-timers was made to “enhance the daytime responsiveness” of the district, according to Deputy Chief Mike Cotton. The district is currently a volunteer force, with a handful of full-time administrative firefighters serving as chief, assistant chief and deputy chiefs.

South Whidbey Fire/EMS eliminated part-time paid firefighter positions in 2009 for budgetary reasons, but as a result of responding to a projected 2,455 calls this year, the burden has become far too heavy on the shoulders of volunteers who often work daytime jobs on the mainland, officials say.

“When we find out we’re having calls during the middle of the day and we’re not responding to them, that’s unacceptable from this side of the table,” said Commissioner Kenon Simmons. “The community has the expectation that we’re going to show up when they call 9-1-1, and it’s a reasonable expectation.”

Tension was rife between paid and unpaid members of the department prior to its elimination six years ago — it was also an election issue — which is something that the district plans on avoiding this time around.

“I think what a lot of the volunteers’ concern was that it was going to be the way it was before,” said Fire Chief Rusty Palmer said. “The way it was designed before, quite frankly, was adversarial.”

“People that are hired need to understand that they’re here in support of the volunteers just as each one of us in a white shirt is,” he added.

The commissioners opted to hire part-timers in June as opposed to Jan. 1 because they said it was already late in the year and it would take a few months to organize the hiring process and train the recruits.

Eldon Baker, a lieutenant at Station 31, pointed out that many of the volunteers who have trained with the district have left for paid jobs with other districts.

“We could use that to lure them here and keep them,” Baker said. “That’s the backbone — if you can get some of those younger guys or gals to stay, that would help us tremendously.”

Officials said they would like to hire in-house because they believe the best candidates are volunteers already on staff, while it could also help lower training costs.

“We have to hire the best people for our community and I do believe a lot of those are right here, without a doubt,” Simmons said.

Palmer’s goal is eventually to have a resident program again.

“We’ve got more and more people working on the mainland now, we don’t have those people working here on the island in the daytime and we are short. The time has come,” Assistant Chief Paul Busch said. “A lot of things have changed and we’re to that point. Our job is to serve the public and the only way we can serve the public in an efficient manner is to hire these people on and guarantee that response in the daytime.”