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Dayton City council debates standby shifts, pay and inspection duties as fire calls rise
Summary
City staff presented models that would shift Dayton’s volunteer-driven fire response toward scheduled standby time, $30/hour call pay and a potential full‑time position; council asked for a clear baseline of actual costs, a risk ranking of call types and formal job descriptions before committing to budget changes.
City Administrator opened a work session on fire‑department staffing and told the Dayton City mayor and council the presentation “is basically just a regurgitation of what was sent out in the packet” as staff reviewed call volumes, stress on paid‑on‑call personnel and several staffing options.
Staff presented two 2025 call‑volume projections — roughly 639 on a linear extrapolation and about 662 from software-based projections — and said some models assume a 10% increase for 2026 (about 720 calls). Fire Chief (S3) cautioned projections are moving targets and noted the department’s year‑to‑date calls represented a roughly 13.8% increase compared with last year.
The meeting focused on three tradeoffs: firefighter well‑being on the current paid‑on‑call model, service levels and the budgetary consequences of different staffing mixes. Staff described a standby model proposed by a consultant that would schedule roughly 7–7.5 hours of standby (approximately 4:00–11:30 p.m.), require two hours at the station and leave about 5.5 hours at‑home standby. Standby pay in that model is $17 per hour; if a firefighter is called to active duty they would be paid an elevated call rate (presented as $30 per hour) for the call time instead of the standby rate.
Council members pressed staff on how the spreadsheets count overlapping hours and pay. The city administrator acknowledged some hours in the spreadsheet are “double counted” — standby pay and call pay both appear depending on when a call occurs — and said staff would provide clearer breakdowns. Several members asked staff to "unbake" the budget (produce a baseline showing what costs actually would have been under the existing paid‑on‑call model without the $30/hour assumption) so council could compare apples to apples.
Concern about when shortages occur dominated the policy debate. Multiple council members said the turnout problem is most acute in daytime hours when volunteer firefighters have outside jobs; they questioned whether evening standby time would address a daytime coverage problem. Fire Chief (S3) noted full‑time officers already perform other day‑time duties (training, inspections, maintenance) and said a hybrid of some scheduled daytime coverage plus evening duty crews is one practical option.
Standards were discussed as context: staff cited NFPA guidance (transcript reference read as “NFPA 17 20”; staff and council discussed this as NFPA 1720) when describing goals for structure‑fire staffing and response times. The chief said NFPA guidance is focused on fire calls and that local classification (rural vs. suburban) affects applicable response‑time expectations.
Budget history was also reviewed. Staff presented a 2023 budget line shown as $327,000 with higher actuals in the packet, described 2024 changes (including hiring an assistant chief) and said the 2025 budget had assumed $30/hour pay for part‑timers tied to a shift in the model. Staff explained some anticipated state aid dollars are currently routed to the fire relief association, which affects whether the city may use those dollars to fund retirement or salaries; staff said the council would need the relief association’s agreement to reallocate those funds.
Council members asked staff to return with three concrete items before the council moves a budget or creates new positions: (1) a baseline "unbaked" scenario showing actuals under the existing paid‑on‑call model, (2) a risk ranking of call types so the council can see which low‑acuity calls could be deprioritized if staffing is constrained, and (3) job descriptions and clear duties for any proposed full‑time firefighter or fire‑inspector stipend. The city administrator agreed to run the scenarios and provide the requested materials for the next budget work session.
The meeting did not include formal votes or ordinance changes; it concluded with staff agreeing to run the baseline scenarios, provide a clearer accounting of hours and dollars, and draft job descriptions for proposed positions.
