Fire-paramedic service faces $13-M budget overrun fuelled by injury claims, OT By: Chris Kitching Posted: 6:57 PM CST Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024

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The Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service is projecting a nearly $13-million budget overrun in 2024, largely due to increases in firefighter injury claims and overtime to fill staffing gaps.

The WFPS will ask city council’s finance committee to approve the overrun, which is recommended in a staff report, at a Nov. 12 meeting.

“The recommendations will enable the department to continue delivering fire and emergency medical services across the city at current service levels,” WFPS financial controller John Hall wrote in the report.

Council previously approved an annual operating budget of $233 million for the WFPS.

The department projected over-expenditures of $15.5 million for fire services and $932,000 for EMS. The total is expected to fall to $12.8 million when higher revenues are factored in.

“The department does not expect this position to improve significantly during the rest of the year,” Hall wrote.

Fire-related overtime is expected to be $7 million over budget. The WFPS projected an overspend of $4.4 million for fire-related Workers Compensation Board injury claims.

“That is worrisome, because we do realize there is a growing burden on the (WFPS) every year,” said Coun. Vivian Santos, chair of the community services committee, which oversees the WFPS.

Hall’s report said the number of approved WCB claims has tripled — from about 40 per month in 2016 to 120 per month in 2024.

Last year’s average was 90 per month. Hall said the WFPS is investigating the cause of the recent increase, noting there are higher numbers of back injuries and psychological issues across the department.

While consistent with 2022 and 2023, absence rates — for vacation, long-term injury, training, parental leave or other reasons — frequently increase the need for overtime to ensure a minimum complement of 167 firefighters per shift is met, the report said.

“The overtime budget has been insufficient to meet the department’s cost given the absences observed and the vacation load afforded to longer serving employees,” Hall wrote.

The WFPS exceeded its fire overtime budget by $4.7 million in 2023 and $7.6 million in 2022. The overrun in 2018 was $1.1 million.

The WFPS has not met council’s directive to find $3 million in cost savings, after an earlier proposal to take fire trucks out of service (instead of calling in staff on overtime) and cut positions starting next year were rejected, the report said.

“We cannot overtime ourselves out of the problem.”–Tom Bilous

Unions representing the city’s firefighters and paramedics said increased staffing levels can help to reduce the need for overtime.

The United Fire Fighters of Winnipeg has advocated for council to increase the staffing ratio to 1.29 firefighters per seat in a fire vehicle to 1.35.

“That would be a good start,” said UFFW president Tom Bilous. “We cannot overtime ourselves out of the problem.”

Since the existing ratio was set years ago, call volumes have increased and firefighters have responded to more “unnatural” events, such as opioid-related incidents, said Bilous, noting overtime used to be “very rare.”

He said the city could also take steps to fill vacancies faster.

Finance chair Coun. Jeff Browaty said it might be time for council to revisit the staffing ratio, after increases were proposed in the past.

“We’ve seen sort of a pattern of increased overtime, as well as the increased cost of Workers Compensation Board claims,” he said.

UFFW and the Manitoba Government and General Employees’ Union, which represents city paramedics, said overtime leads to burnout, which can lead to mental or physical injury-related leave.

“They’re working short all the time. They’re doing more with less all the time,” MGEU president Kyle Ross said of his union’s members.

Expanding community paramedicine would be a good step, because it’s not efficient to send a fire crew to a call where paramedics would be appropriate, he added.

Earlier this year, the province gave $3.4 million to the city toward 40 new firefighters for a new station in Waverley West.

Bilous said a behaviour health unit launched in 2021 and a new five-priority dispatch system are positive steps toward supporting WFPS staff.

The behavioural health unit, set up to provide timely and targeted mental health support, is one of several programs and resources introduced in the past five years to help keep all staff healthy and safe, WFPS Chief Christian Schmidt said in a statement.

“The WFPS has also focused on reducing the stigma associated with mental health struggles and accessing help. We want to ensure members feel safe in accessing the resources and services they need.”

Santos hopes the city explores a new funding model with the province as part of long-term measures. A lot of calls the WFPS responds to are related to mental health, addictions or housing, she said.

Hall’s report also cited a $1 million overspend on emergency social services. ESS was transferred to the WFPS from community services with “very little operating budget” to deal with incidents, such as building evacuations that led to residents needing hotel rooms and food, he wrote.

The WFPS also expects overruns on vehicle maintenance ($550,000), firefighting foam ($400,000) and clothing and personal protective equipment ($360,000).

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca