Budget panel hears Kansas Fire Marshal ask for investigator pay increases, debates FTE and contractor cuts

The Kansas Legislative Budget Committee on Oct. 12 reviewed the Fire Marshal's requested changes to the Transportation and Public Safety budget, including a $401,547 investigator salary progression proposal for fiscal 2026 and a number of fee-fund adjustments that the committee removed or reduced.

The Fire Marshal told the committee the agency asked for $60,000 in special revenue in fiscal 2025 to hire an economic-impact contractor to comply with requirements of HB 2648; the Legislative Budget Committee (LBC) removed that supplemental enhancement request along with other supplemental requests. "This is a request associated with the HB 2648' bill from last year that requires an economic impact statement," a fiscal analyst said, summarizing the agency request and the LBC decision. The Fire Marshal added, "we do have 75 positions. We are 100% fee funded, through the Fire Marshal Fee Fund, the Boiler Fund, the Elevator Fund, and the Safe Cigarettes Fund."

Why it matters: the agency said pay and staffing decisions affect investigative capacity, inspections and firefighter support across Kansas. The Fire Marshal described a reorganization that moved boiler- and elevator-program staff into a separate industrial safety division and proposed shifting 3.5 full-time equivalent positions among programs; the LBC deleted that FTE change. For fiscal 2026 the agency requested an all-funds increase of roughly $1.2 million (about 11.9%) driven by the $401,547 investigator pay plan and $785,439 for incident response equipment, investigations and training; the LBC removed only the supplemental enhancements tied to pay parity and the economic-impact contractor, and asked for deletion of the 3.5 FTEs.

Agency operations and numbers: the Fire Marshal said its investigation division handled 484 investigations in 2024, including 39 fatalities, and that two special agents were at a fatality scene in Allen County at the time of testimony. The prevention division employs 20 inspectors and four field supervisors and conducts about 11,000 inspections annually, focusing on schools, restaurants, assembly venues and hospitals. The industrial safety side reported roughly 14,000 boiler inspections statewide and nearly 8,000 registered elevators. The agency also described a search-and-rescue program relying on contracted local responders and said it deployed 36 Kansans to hurricane response missions in Florida and North Carolina; those deployments are billed for reimbursement by the receiving states.

Firefighter grants and rural volunteer needs: the Fire Marshal described grant work the office has funded from fee revenue, saying this is the last year the office can use operating funds to purchase and distribute turnout gear. The agency said it awarded 101 sets of gear this year (about 18% of what departments requested), noting many recipient departments have operating budgets under $20,000. The Fire Marshal offered a replacement estimate: roughly 1,600 sets of gear are needed each year in Kansas and each full set costs about $4,000 and has a 10-year lifespan. He cited neighboring states' programs: Colorado's roughly $3.25 million in grants, Nebraska's active volunteer tax credit, and Oklahoma's $10,000-per-department and $4 million grant fund as examples other states use to support volunteers.

Code adoption and HB 2648: the Fire Marshal said Kansas is operating under an older state fire-prevention code and called out procedural obstacles to updating the code. He told the committee the last legislative session included a requirement to conduct an economic-impact statement on any administrative rule or regulation change, and the office lacks trained staff to perform broad economic-impact analyses on a multi-hundred-page code. "We do not have trained staff to do so," he said, referring to the new requirement and the complexity of adopting updated national consensus codes.

Discussion highlights: Representative Delverde questioned differences between the agency request and the LBC figures; the fiscal analyst explained the LBC removals were tied to the listed enhancement items. Representative Carr asked about pay parity and whether the agency had starting-salary figures for investigators; the Fire Marshal said investigator hiring requires prior law-enforcement certification and at least five years' experience, that he did not have the precise pay table in the packet, and offered to provide salary details later. Representative Bloom asked whether the agency inspects volunteer rural departments; the Fire Marshal said local fire departments are autonomous and the office does not perform routine oversight of their pay or organization.

Outlook and next steps: the committee deleted or reduced several of the Fire Marshal's requested enhancements and directed further clarification on some items. No final appropriation was reached during the hearing; any changes must be reflected in subsequent committee action or appropriations bills.

Ending note: the Fire Marshal closed by urging the committee to consider alternate funding paths for firefighter recruitment and equipment grants and to weigh staffing and code-adoption hurdles when evaluating future rulemaking and budget requests.