This paper presents a strategic analysis of fire and emergency services in Collinsville Township, examining current response time deficiencies, staffing shortfalls, and coverage gaps in light of ongoing residential development. Using a Diamond-E analytical framework, the analysis evaluates management preferences, organizational capabilities, available resources, and environmental demands. Three strategic goals are proposed: constructing a new substation on a donated parcel, pursuing SAFER and AFG grant funding to address staffing and equipment needs, and establishing a total quality improvement program. The paper also outlines change management strategies—particularly cooptation and education—to secure stakeholder buy-in, with a focus on the fire chief's pivotal role in implementation.
Development in and around the township of Collinsville is inevitable and is currently underway on the east side of the county. As currently configured, fire and emergency services are inadequate to meet the needs of the additional people who are expected to move into the area. Current and future implementation of fire and emergency services must provide an affordable and balanced configuration of services, which ultimately must be measured in terms of response times and coverage. Several variables in the community point to the construction of a substation in the area of new development. The availability of funding for construction, equipment, and staffing is being explored, and a feasibility study is an anticipated next step. The mayor, the city council, and the residents of Collinsville must receive assurance of sufficient staff, equipment, and stations to meet the recommended NFPA 1720 staffing standards and the ISO standards of coverage for the population density, road conditions, climate, and terrain. To that end, the following presenting problems, areas of study, and recommendations are proposed.
This analysis commences with an assessment of past performance that fosters articulation of the current strategy and a forecast of future performance under the current strategy in light of increased demand. From that base, the proposal identifies the need, nature, and speed of change that is desirable.
Collinsville is located on a peninsula formed by rivers on two sides and large rock-outcrop mountains on the third side. The community has a population of approximately 12,000 people. The town contains three schools—one each at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. A small hospital is located in the town, along with the typical array of governmental facilities and a busy downtown commercial area. Currently, fire service is provided by a fire department located near the town center. That fire department responds with two engines, one ALS ambulance, one BLS ambulance, one ladder truck, a tanker, and a brush truck. Two staff vehicles and a supply truck are also located at the department. Staffing consists of a fire chief and a fire code inspector who work Monday–Friday day schedules, two firefighters each on 24–48-hour shifts, and 20 paid on-call staff members. Mutual aid is located 12 miles from the local fire department at the closest point and 23 miles away at the farthest point.
The following problem statements and study areas guide the analysis:
The fire chief is willing to expand the department. However, funds are needed to do so. A parcel of land in the development area has been donated for construction of a new station.
Current issues with response times and coverage must be assessed, as must the forecast impact of a new substation on those metrics.
Potential funding sources include: SAFER and AFG grants for staffing and benefits (limited to one to two years); AFG grants for equipment and training (limited to four years); property and use taxes derived from the increase in residents, which would overlap with the end of grant periods; ambulance fees diverted from town coffers directly to the fire department; ordinance fees for residents outside the township limits; and donations of cash and materials from local citizens for construction of the new station.
The proposed service configuration includes a new fire station that is fully but modestly equipped; one additional full-time firefighter/Emergency Medical Technician; and a voluntary force of firefighters and Emergency Medical Technicians to be recruited. It should be noted that volunteer firefighter recruitment in rural areas has not been successful in the past and will require dedicated effort.
To add structure to this analysis and provide common points of referral, a Diamond-E framework was employed. Briefly, the four points of the diamond represent consideration of management preferences, the organization, resources needed and available, and the strategy. The "E" point of the framework represents the external environment. Criteria for good strategy are that it must be sustainable, unique, and have real or perceived added value.
The tensions to be addressed in this analysis are as follows: Want-to-do (the preferences of management), Can-do and Able-to-do (the organization, capabilities, and resources), and Need-to-do (the environment). The sweet spot where these tensions overlap is the nexus of the strategy. To further elucidate:
(1) The community is requesting better response times in the rural areas surrounding the township of Collinsville (environment / need-to-do); (2) the fire department's official position is to expand the department in the area to improve response times (management preferences / want-to-do); (3) the fire department does not believe its response times are always adequate (organization and capabilities / can-do); and (4) the fire department is currently only able to respond from a single centralized location (resources / able-to-do).
The purposes of focusing the environmental analysis are to define the boundaries of the strategic proposals, to highlight questions that have emerged regarding demand, supply, competition, and government, and to establish a time horizon for the analysis.
Response time is measured from the time emergency dispatchers receive a call to the time when the first equipment arrives on the scene. The public, however, clocks response time from the moment they first become aware of an emergency incident. Fire suppression time begins at the moment of ignition and runs until the fire is actually extinguished. Response time is influenced by a number of variables, including undiscovered combustion time, discovery time, activation of 911 call processing, dispatch time, turnout and drive time, initial setup time, vertical response time (time to fire location), fire-fighting, and extinguishment.
According to the National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS), 50% of structure fire response times are generally less than five minutes, regardless of the time of day, season, or region of the country. The nationwide 90th percentile is less than 11 minutes for structure fires. The Collinsville response time logs show average times for fire calls by designated region as follows: Town = 7:06 minutes; Northwest = 8:01 minutes; Northeast = 9:09 minutes; Southeast = 9:53 minutes; and North Rural = 16:27 minutes. For emergency service responses triggered by motor vehicle collisions, the response time averages 24 minutes with reported injuries and 27 minutes without reported injuries on the Interstate, compared to an average of six minutes for collisions in town.
By NFIRS standards, all average response times in Collinsville township and surrounding regions exceed the national average. The response times in the rural area where new development is underway are unacceptably high. This data confirms the fire chief's concerns about the inadequacy of the current service configuration in light of any foreseeable growth. Coverage reports from the Collinsville Fire Department logs indicate that the bulk of service calls—upward of 90%, according to the fire chief—are for ambulances, primarily for car accidents on the Interstate and in town.
The fire chief reports that staff rarely receives formal training and that many personnel have been unable to maintain their formal certifications as a result. The ambulances typically make runs with one staff person and are joined on the scene by other staff as they become available. The chief argues that the fundamental problem is getting paid on-call staff to incidents in remote areas. The need for training has been established, and recruitment to increase the ranks of on-call members of the response team must be bolstered.
"Three strategic recommendations outlined"
"Cooptation strategy for fire chief buy-in"
"Quality improvement program for operations"
"Scenario planning and alternative proposals"
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