(a) When employees of the responding party are sent from the employing jurisdiction to another jurisdiction or jurisdictions in response to a request for aid or assistance under this chapter, they have the same powers, duties, rights, privileges, and immunities as if they were performing their duties in the jurisdiction in which they normally function.

Terms Used In Tennessee Code 58-8-109

  • Aid: means the same as assistance, except that aid is provided in an occurrence during any period of time when a state of emergency has not been declared. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
  • Assistance: means the provision of personnel, equipment, facilities, services, supplies, and other resources to assist in firefighting, law enforcement, the provision of public works services, the provision of emergency medical care, the provision of civil defense services, or any other emergency assistance one governmental entity is able to provide to another in response to a request for assistance in a municipal, county, state, or federal state of emergency. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
  • Emergency: means an occurrence or threat of an occurrence, whether natural or man-made, that results in or may result in substantial injury or harm to the population or substantial damage to or loss of property and which results in a declaration of a state of emergency by a municipal mayor, a county mayor or executive, the governor, or the president. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
  • Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
  • Occurrence: means the imminent threat of an event or an actual event and its aftermath, whether natural or man-made, that could lead to or results in bodily injury or property damage. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
  • Requesting party: means a governmental entity that requests aid or assistance from another governmental entity under this chapter. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
  • Responding party: means a governmental entity that has received and responded to a request to provide mutual aid or assistance to another governmental entity under this chapter. See Tennessee Code 58-8-102
(b) Employees of the responding party will be considered as the responding party’s employees at all times while performing their duties under this chapter for purposes of the workers’ compensation law and for that purpose will be considered as acting within the course and scope of their employment with the responding party.
(c) Under § 29-20-107(f), for liability purposes only, employees of the responding party are to be considered employees of the requesting party while performing their duties under this chapter at the scene of the occurrence or emergency or other locations necessary for the response while under the supervision of the requesting party. At all other times in the response, including traveling to the scene and returning to the employing jurisdiction, such employees are to be considered for liability purposes to be employees of the responding party.