Syracuse Fire Department Budget Hearing - April 21, 2026
Syracuse Fire Department Budget Hearing - April 21, 2026
The Syracuse Common Council's Public Safety Committee, chaired by Councilor Donamore, held a budget hearing on April 21, 2026, to review the Fire Department's operations and fiscal year 2027 budget request. Fire Chief and First Deputy Chief Elton Davis presented an overview of departmental operations, staffing, call volumes, and budget needs. The department is requesting a 2.9% increase over its combined civilian and sworn budget, citing contractual obligations, rising costs, and the need to maintain safety amid growing call volumes and economic development.
Discussion Items
- Operations Overview: Chief Davis described the department's 11 strategically located fire stations housing 10 engine companies, 6 ladder companies, a rescue company (7 members), and an 8-person hazardous materials team. There are 75 firefighters on duty 24/7. 92% of staffing is on front-line apparatus; 8% are support staff across eight divisions (training, maintenance, communications, EMS, special operations, emergency management, health and safety, fire investigation, administration).
- Call Volume and Trends: In 2025, the department responded to 25,863 alarms. So far in 2026, they have responded to 7,786 calls, on pace for 26,800 calls – a 23% increase from 2021. Major structure fires are occurring every 3-4 days; 80 major fires in 2025, on pace for 96 in 2026. The department rescued 11 civilians from fires so far in 2026 (8 in all of 2025). Response times improved by 9% (16-second reduction) last year. 391 structure fires were contained to one room in 2025.
- Fire Prevention and Inspections: Last year, fire marshals conducted over 1,100 fire inspections and had over 1,500 educational interactions. The department reviewed 612 plan reviews for construction permits. Civilian fire fatalities dropped 85.7% from 2024 to 2025, with a 14-month span without a civilian fire fatality.
- Budget Request and Financial Stewardship: The department has underspent its budget by 1.34% over the past eight years. The FY27 request is a 2.9% increase. 90.3% of the budget ($41.97 million) is personnel, including collective bargaining obligations; 9.7% ($4.53 million) covers operations (equipment, supplies, maintenance, PPE, etc.). $34 million is for salaries, with $5 million in overtime. Councilor Nave complimented the chief on keeping expenditures in check, noting only a 2.25% increase for sworn personnel year-over-year.
- Additional Station (Station 7) and Costs: Councilor Caldwell advocated for reopening additional fire stations as the city grows, specifically mentioning Station 7 on Fayette Street. Chief Davis estimated costs: staffing at approximately $1.8 million (recurring), a new station building at $12-15 million, a fire apparatus at $1.2-1.8 million, with tools and equipment absorbable in operations.
- Overtime and Injuries: The chief provided three years of overtime data. Firefighter injuries were reduced by 32% from 2024 to 2025, but 45 firefighters were injured in the line of duty last year. Currently 6-10 firefighters are out on line-of-duty injuries, creating overtime for backfilling.
- Fleet and Apparatus Replacement: The department went 14 years without purchasing large apparatus until 2018. Now they have a replacement schedule: buying two engines every other year and a ladder truck in alternate years. They seek to lock in pricing contracts. The budget shows wide salary ranges for fire captain/assistant equipment (10k-106k); the chief explained that the maintenance crew does work of five people.
- Administrative Service Manager Position: The department requested a new civilian HR position (estimated $80,000-$85,000) to handle FMLA, ADA, discipline, and legal issues, freeing executive staff to focus on fire suppression and operations. The position currently shows "to be determined" in the budget.
- Vault Pay: Chief Davis explained vault pay – comp time accrued under the old "wheel" schedule. Only 15-20 firefighters have remaining vault pay, and the chief suggested paying it out to eliminate the cost.
- Collaboration with Police and County: Chief Davis reported ongoing conversations with Police Chief Russ about sharing IT, fleet maintenance, and parts purchasing to achieve efficiencies. They are also coordinating with the county on purchasing contracts and hazmat response. The Syracuse Fire Department is the closest hazmat team to the Micron site, and they have been in discussions with Micron about standby teams. The department is seeking funding from the county for regional hazmat/technical rescue services, which they provide as an "insurance policy" for the community.
- Retirement Eligibility: There are currently about 6 vacancies. Two retirement cohorts are eligible in July and November 2027, totaling 68 firefighters eligible to retire by end of calendar year 2027. The department may need to run two hiring classes closer together.
- ISO Rating: The department holds an ISO Class 1 rating – the highest possible – achieved by only 1% of fire departments nationwide. This keeps insurance rates lower for city properties.
- False Alarms vs. Alarm Activations: Chief Davis clarified that most "false alarms" are actually alarm activations caused by cooking, smoking, etc. About 7,000 such calls occur annually; some escalate to major fires.
Key Outcomes
- The Council took no formal vote during this hearing; it was a budget work session.
- The department's $41.97 million personnel budget (90.3% of total) and $4.53 million operations budget will be considered as part of the city's overall FY27 budget deliberation.
- Councilor Caldwell expressed support for reopening Station 7 and requested continued discussion on additional stations.
- Councilor Nave acknowledged the department's fiscal discipline and the modest 2.9% increase request.
- Councilor Hudson raised the potential for state funding for regional hazmat and technical rescue teams, which the chief confirmed they are pursuing.
- The chief agreed to provide detailed data on vault pay outstanding to Councilor More.
- No reductions to the fire department budget were proposed during the hearing; the chief asked that the department be spared any cuts because it is already at minimum staffing.
Meeting Transcript
Good morning. Um morning everybody, I'm Counselor Donamore, head of public safety, and we're here today to talk about the fire department budget. I have with me Counselors Hudson, Counselor Nave, Counselor Caldwell, Councilor Monte Monto, President Pantiagua, Counselor Williams, uh Fire Chief. And I don't know that this is first deputy chief Elton Davis. Oh, and first deputy chief Elton Davis. Thank you for being here. I'll give it to you, Chief. Okay, I'll start off by just doing an overview of our operations and then get in uh to some budget stuff, uh, overview, and then I'll allow for questions on anything you guys have. I'll start off by saying, you know, our uh what our fire department does is physically and uh mentally demanding, it's complex and critical for the safety of our city. Um basically simply put our constituents call us on their worst day, they trust and they call us when they need our help. Um we have eleven strategically located fire stations that house ten engine companies, six ladder companies. Um there's four people on each of those apparatus. We have a rescue company that has seven members, and we have an eight-person hazardous materials team that doubles as an engine company and a trunk company, and they operate out of station five on North Geddis. We have 75 firefighters on duty, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and every call that we're dispatched to, we answer every call. Um 92% of our staffing, um it's I have a handout if you look at our staffing, 92% of our staffing, um they work on the front line on fire trucks that leaves eight percent of us, um you can see some of our staff that are in the back of the room here, eight percent of us our support staff across eight divisions um that make up our operation that help make our operations efficient and effective. Um our support staff during the day, Monday through Friday, and they do also responses um to emergencies. Um we have eight different divisions, training division, maintenance division, our communications, EMS, special operations, we have an emergency management group, health and safety office, our fire investigation unit which investigates every fire in the city, uh, per state law, um and we have an administration and um the fire chief and the first deputy chief deal with internal affairs functions, and that supports our mission um with our frontline firefighters. Um and a lot of people think um you guys know but um people think fire suppression is all we do, but that's not it. Uh we have a broader mission, um it's fire prevention. Um we do a lot of fire inspections with our fire marshals. Last year we did over eleven hundred fire inspections on scene of uh locations. Uh we do fire education. We had over 1,500 interactions with our constituents in the city. Um last year we reviewed six hundred and twelve plan reviews for construction permits we work with hand in hand with the department of code enforcement. Our EMS response, we do a ride out range of medical emergencies from difficulty breathing to somebody's heart stopping or somebody's stopping breathing. So we do all the different high priority um EMS calls. Um, like I stated before, we do hazmat incidents that involve dangerous and toxic materials. Uh just the other day we had a call with um something as simple as there was um two um 50-gallon drums of formeldehyde up against the building, and our team goes and we stabilize the incident um the situation uh for our constituents, and they are the county wide hazmat team, and they're also um dispatched um to multiple counties if needed because of their tech um skill. Um we have a technical rescue team um that's our rescue company. They do uh confined space, rope rescues, trench rescues, water rescues, and they deal with any kind of collapse hazards, and they also respond to every vehicle accident in the city. They stabilize the car, um extricate patients if needed, and we provide patient care with our engine companies. One of um the second page that you have in your handout is our alarm responses. Last year we responded to 25,863 calls. Um the last few years we've had record-breaking amounts of calls. Last year was another high year. Um I would say that historically these have been high years, but I think this is just the norm now, this amount of calls. Um so far this year, we responded to 7,786 calls. Um we're on pace to have 26,800 calls, and that's a 23% increase from 2021. Um typically our call volume in the city is half of the call volume that fire departments in the county answer. So we are a very busy fire department, one of the busiest in the state. Um the next page um has our major fires, and that's a fire where when we pull up, there's heavy smoke and fire uh showing out of windows and roofs and really bad situations for our constituents. Last year we had 80 fires. So far this year we have uh 28. Um, we're having a fire every three or four days this year so far. Um we're on pace to have 96 major structure fires. Um over the last four years, we averaged 82 fires um a year. Um in those fires. Last year we made um some heroic um actions. We rescued eight civilians out of those fires. Um so far this year we've rescued 11 um civilians while they were trapped inside a fire.
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