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Santa Barbara Fire Department reports steady call growth, moves to new national records system
Summary
Fire Chief Chris Veil and Fire Marshal Ryan De Giulio presented the department's 2024 annual data, showing roughly 12,100 calls for service, rising response volumes, detailed response-time metrics, expanded training and community outreach, and plans to adopt a new national records system the chief described as "NARES/NHERES."
Santa Barbara Fire Chief Chris Veil presented the department's 2024 annual report to the Fire and Police Commission on Feb. 27, saying the department responded to roughly 12,100 calls for service in 2024, up from 11,560 in 2023.
Veil said fires accounted for 1.66% of calls while medical and rescue calls made up about 72% of the department's workload. "When our fire apparatus show up, they have a fire. They have to pull off a hose line or at minimum an extinguisher and extinguish a fire," Veil said, distinguishing working fires from minor smoke or nuisance calls.
The report emphasized response-time performance and how the department measures it. Veil described total response time as the interval from 911 call pickup to units on scene and gave the department's 2024 annual average total response time as 7 minutes and 2 seconds. He reported call-processing time across all incidents at 1 minute and 9 seconds, turnout time (time from lights on to wheels rolling) at roughly 8090…
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