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Peachtree City Fire and Rescue Q & A

The Citizen was advised of serious staffing shortages plaguing the Peachtree City Fire and Rescue Department. Officials say it’s the one thing that’s keeping them from a Class 3 ISO rating and residents from receiving lower home insurance rates a Class 3 rating would generate. We asked them a series of questions and sent them to Peachtree City Fire Chief Stony Lohr. The responses were returned by Peachtree City Manager Bernie McMullen.

Here are the questions and answers in their entirety.

Dear Chief Lohr,

We have been advised of a serious staffing shortage at the Peachtree City Fire Department and would like to inquire about the following:

1. At a house fire on Carnellian Lane in Peachtree City, we understand you had one person per apparatus. Is this true? Is this an ideal situation? If not, how many personnel should be on each apparatus according to your SOP?

The fire department’s SOP calls for 3 engines, Tower, Rescue, 1 medic unit, plus the shift commander to respond to a residential structure fire. The Carnellian Lane Fire had the following apparatus and personnel respond:

• Engine 84 (2 personnel).

• Engine 81 (1 person).

• Engine 82 (1 person).

• Quint 83 (1 person).

• Tower 8 (2 personnel).

• Rescue 8 (1 person).

• Medic 81 (2 personnel).

• Shift Commander (1 person).

• Other responders - 3.

• Volunteers — 5.

• Total on scene - 19.

There is no SOP on the number of personnel per apparatus, with the exception of medic units, which are required by law to have 2 personnel.

2. Based on the most recent assessment of the department, how many people do you need to operate the Peachtree City Fire/Rescue Department? Please give the ideal figure, the maximum and the bare minimum, if plausible.

The independent assessment conducted by Emergency Services Consulting Inc. or ESCi in 2004 recommends one of the following scenarios.

A. Staff each PTC rotating shift with 15 personnel to operate the apparatus below, with an automatic reciprocal mutual aid with Fayette County:

• 4 Advanced Life Support Engines - 8 personnel.

• 2 ALS Ambulances - 4 personnel.

• 1 Ladder Truck - 2 personnel.

• 1 Command Officer.

B. Staff each Peachtree City rotating shift with 12 personnel (2004 staffing level) to operate the apparatus below, with the command officer fulfilled by senior duty officer, cross-staffing of the ladder truck, rescue truck, and specialty units, and Fayette County Fire Department dispatched on all structure fires and appropriate incidents.

• 3 Advanced Life Support Engines - 6 personnel.

• 2 ALS Ambulances - 4 personnel.

• 1 Ladder Truck/Engine - 2 personnel.

• 1 Command Officer.

Four personnel were added to the Fire Department in the FY 2005 budget (3 to increase the shift complement to 13). The City also maintains mutual (but not automatic) aid agreements with both Fayette County and Coweta County.

3. How many people do you currently have employed at the department including full-time and volunteers?

39 Full-time (13 per shift).

15 Part-Time (to cover vacations & off time).

6 Staff Officers.

37 Volunteers.

4. How many stations do you have? Where are they located, and how many people do you have manning each station?

There are four fire stations located throughout the City, with the staffing levels noted:

• Station 81 - 110 Paschal Road (3 firefighters per shift)

• Station 82 - 105 Peachtree Pkwy North (4 firefighters per shift plus 1 shift commander and staff officers)

• Station 83 - 482 Peachtree Pkwy South (3 firefighters per shift)

• Station 84 - 451 Crabapple Lane (2 firefighters per shift)

• Total — 13.

5. What challenges (safety, overtime issues, over budget issues) have you endured by not having adequate staff to run the department?

Regardless of staffing levels, safety is always a significant issue. The department’s mission every day is to provide the best possible emergency service to the community. Overtime has been adequately budgeted and is approximately 30 hours per year per staff employee. Part-time hours also help to increase staffing levels.

6. What is your ISO rating, when was it last given and what did the inspector say in regards to your staffing levels, word for word, according to the report?

Our rating is an ISO Class 4. Our most recent ISO evaluation was in July 2001. The Department score improved from Class 5 to Class 4, but the overall community score remained at Class 4. The report says “an increase in on-duty company personnel by one person will increase the fire department credit by .45 percent and an increase in the response by other fire department members by one person will increase the fire department credit by .15 percent.” What this means is that we will improve our rating by .45 percent for every firefighter added to the on-duty crew (one 24 hour position is three people). Persons who are on duty at a station count as full credit each. Persons who respond from home or other non-station locations count as one third or one sixth credit, depending upon the quality of records.

7. Have you investigated staffing levels at other fire departments of similar size that offer both paramedics and firefighter services? How many people do these departments (please name them) have to run their departments?

Yes. Staff has collected information on all 11 cities in Georgia that have been categorized by DCA as Class B (as is Peachtree City). Of these, the on-duty strength ranges from 11 to 30.

Alpharetta: pop. 34,245; 5 stations; 25 per shift.

Dalton: pop. 31,478; 5 stations; 27 per shift.

East Point: pop. 35,457; 4 stations; 6-19 per shift.

Gainesville: pop. 31,107; 4 stations; 25 per shift.

Hinesville: pop. 30,566; 2 stations; 11 per shift.

LaGrange: pop. 26,955; 3 stations; 14 per shift.

Peachtree City: pop. 33,810; 4 stations; 13 per shift.

Smyrna: pop. 45,755; 4 stations; 20 per shift.

Valdosta: pop. 45,373; 7 stations; 30 per shift.

• Hinesville and Peachtree City have volunteers.

8. How many additional positions did you request from the Peachtree City Council this year. Was that request denied? What was the reasoning given for why the request was denied? What is your reaction to this?

Initially fire department staff requested 9 firefighters (three 24-hour positions); the fire chief reduced this to 6 firefighters (two positions at $385,165) to be fiscally responsible and consistent with the department’s intermediate goal to have fifteen firefighters on duty to be able to respond with all primary apparatus. During the subsequent budget development and review, the City Manager postponed any recommendation on staffing increases pending further study of the fire department staffing levels and assessment of automatic aid agreements.

9. What has the public’s response been when they realize once you arrive on scene that you have one person driving each apparatus?

Current staffing levels provide personnel for each apparatus required by the SOP for the largest event staffed, a residential structure fire. When apparatus arrives with one person, there may be questions, but additional personnel arriving (departmental staff, volunteers, or mutual aid responses) are able to staff the operation to the necessary levels (such as the example in question 1).

10. We understand your department relies heavily on volunteers. How does this help the department? How does this hurt the department? Please give examples?

Volunteers are a tremendous asset to the department. However, over the years volunteer availability has decreased with more and more members working out of town or limited by their employers from responding while at work. Last year there was an average of 1.83 volunteer(s) responding per fire call. This is a national trend with the availability of volunteers. On many “planned” functions like stand-bys they are available because they can schedule time in advance. These include air shows, triathlons, public education, severe weather, etc. The volunteers are also part of the community and understand the wants and needs of the community. The only down side is some people in the community still believe we are a volunteer department, when in reality we are not. The volunteers remain a quality force, but their availability has diminished.

11. What is the department’s average response time. What is the average response time for volunteers and what percentage of volunteers called show up. For example, if you call 5 volunteers, they show up 75 percent of the time.

According to the most recent Fayette County Communications Center report, our average response time so far for July 2005 was 4:44 (minutes: seconds) for fire calls and 4:30 for EMS calls. To this add 1:11 minutes for dispatch time (July), so from the time a call for help was received, it took an average of 5:55 to get the first unit to a fire and 5:41 to get a first unit to a medical call. As mentioned before the average volunteer response is 1.83 Volunteers per call. We have no mechanism to accurately record the time of arrival of each volunteer on scene. For the recent Kedron Hills structure fire, a total of five volunteers (three capable of performing direct firefighting duties) arrived.

12. What would you like the public to know regarding your personnel shortage. Do you fear that one day someone could be hurt or seriously injured, and/or public or private property could be lost because of your shortage. Have you have any personnel injuries or deaths that could be attributed to the man shortage?

There have been no fatalities. Staffing levels are still being assessed to provide the optimal level of service.

13. How long has Chief Lohr been with the department and how long has a personnel shortage existed?

Chief Lohr joined the department as a volunteer in 1992, and joined the career staff as a firefighter/Paramedic in October 1993. He was designated as the Accreditation Manager/Fire Captain in 1998, became the Acting Chief in January 2000 and Fire Chief in January 2001.

14. What are your thoughts on why the city has not done anything to correct the problem?

The city has steadily added full-time personnel to the Fire Department, with three new employees added to the FY 2000 budget, seven new employees in the FY 2001 budget, 1 new employee in FY 2002, and most recently, 4 employees added to the FY 2005 budget (15 new employees over the past 6 years, increasing the department size from 33 to 48 - a 45 percent increase).

The fire department’s budget has increased by over $2.3 million since 2000 ($1.9 million in 2000 to $4.2 million in 2005 and 2006, an increase of 120 percent).

The city also financed the independent study in 2004 to ensure that the department was staffed and operating within industry standards to provide a high level of service in a fiscally responsible manner. The city is currently reviewing staffing numbers and the location and number of fire stations for this same reason.

15. Also, we understand being understaffed affects response time because the emergency responder spends time looking for addresses instead of focusing on getting to the emergency. What is your response to this?

The department encourages firefighters to know where they are going before they begin responding because it is unsafe for a driver to read a map book while driving. Ambulances respond with two persons, and the right seat person can research detailed directions if necessary while en route to the general location.

16. How much did you spend on overtime in 2003, 2004, 2005. What is the percentage of the increases from year to year?

Part-time salaries Overtime salaries

2003 $196,545.84 (116.99 percent of budgeted) $23,370.82 (96.47 percent of budgeted)

2004 $192,922.75 (112.49 percent of budgeted) $22,019.54 (90.90 percent)

2005 $171,155.13 (83.69 percent of budgeted) $23,952.08 (98.87 percent)(as of July)

17. Has money allocated for the fire department been stripped from the fire department to pay for the new library? If so, how much? Has the council promised to put the money back at some point? If so, when?

No money has been stripped from the fire department or any other department for the library expansion, which was approved by the voters in 2003.