Council votes to restore $1.7M to fire budget to prevent loss of heavy rescue truck in Ogden

City council voted Wednesday to restore $1.7 million to the proposed 2019 fire department budget in order to allow the Ogden station in the city's southeast to keep its heavy rescue unit.

Fire Chief Steve Dongworth had told council that in order tocomply with a proposed budget cut of nearly five per cent, he planned to take the specialized truck out of the No. 9fire hall, along with the 10 firefighter positions attached to it.

Moving theunitto another fire station to replace a unit that's being retired would have saved $1.7 million.

The proposed budget for the fire department in 2019 was to be trimmed by $11.3 million from $229 million this year to $217.7 million for the coming year.

Several members of city council hadindicated they were not comfortable with the plan to remove the heavy rescue unit from Ogden because of how it could affect fire response times. On Wednesday, council voted to restore the $1.7 million to prevent the service reduction.

Under the draft plan for the budget, the fire department will also defer the hiring of 20 additional firefighters for new growth stations to 2020.

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Dongworthsays the lost positions willbe cut through attrition, not layoffs.

"We need to hire more firefighters for retirements almost right away here. We've actually planned it that way because we recognize this is a risk," he said.

"We don't want to be in the business of laying off firefighters. So it would not mean layoffs. It would mean we would hire fewer recruits as we move forward into 2019."

Dongworth warned council that the possible loss of the heavy rescue unit in Ogden would impact service, especially in parts of southeast Calgary.

"If you had a fire where a first alarm was struck, i.e.,more resources were required than just the first engine, we would think it would probably take two to three minutes longer to get 12 firefighters on scene, four units on scene, which is what we consider our benchmark to safely fight a fire that's serious and escalating," he said.

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