Toronto's fire chief said Tuesday there should be "minor impact" to services following the closure earlier this week of a fire station in the city's west end and the decommissioning four trucks.
"We looked at years of data. We looked at call volumes and response times. We looked at the best options to meet our budget target with the least impact to service respond times," Chief Jim Sales said, speaking to reporters Tuesday afternoon.
Sales said the fire department should be able to minimize the impact on response time and public safety while allowing for a more complete study of real impact to services by reducing the total fleet from 128 to 124 trucks. He said if the impact is greater than their preliminary calculations, he'll bring a report forward to council to talk about options.
"We are going to look at it closely," he added.
On Monday, Fire Station 424, located on Runnymede Road near Annette Street, closed for good, taking its truck and three others out of service in an effort to save money.
The other trucks axed by the city are located in Scarborough – at fire stations 213 (7 Lapsley Rd.) and 215 (5318 Lawrence Ave. E.) – and at Rexdale’s Fire Station 413 (1549 Albion Rd.).
The 84 firefighters affected by the cutbacks will be relocated to other stations across the city.
Local residents and councillors have this week voiced their concerns about the decision to reduce the size of the city's fleet.
Coun. Sarah Doucette, who represents a portion of the Parkdale – High Park riding, called the closure an outrage.
“Shutting down a station like this and removing this truck, it’s not right,” she said on Monday.
Many councillors have noted that there are already three fire stations within a two-kilometre radius of the Runnymede fire hall that can help serve the local community, but Doucette said that is of little comfort to local residents.
Modernizing response time
Sales mentioned the fire department will be installing a "modern system" in the summer to improve dispatching protocol.
"We have an older … alerting system that doesn't alert all stations and all crews at the same time. There is a built-in delay. This summer, we are installing a modern system. A system that will alter all crews and all stations that require the data on a particular call with less than a three second delay," he said.
Sales said they will also look at technology to improve the stations’ equipment.
"We are looking at the use of handheld iPads to send firefighters data so they have better information quicker," he said.
Sales said fire services is trying to provide the "best services with the mandate" given to the department.
