Council passes 2026 budget with last-minute change to hire additional firefighters By: Joyanne Pursaga Posted: 6:10 PM CST Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025

City council, swayed by a union pressure campaign, unanimously approved a final-hour amendment to boost the size of Winnipeg’s firefighting ranks and voted to pass the 2026 budget Wednesday.

The change revises an initial plan to hire 10 additional firefighters in each of the next four years. Instead, the city will add 20 firefighters in 2026 at an estimated cost of $700,000, and refer a plan to add 20 more in 2027 to that year’s budget process.

“We are hearing that overtime hours are substantial…. We know that we have longer wait times (for emergency responses) and this is really critical,” said Daniel McIntyre councillor Cindy Gilroy, who raised the successful motion calling for the change.

”Because with longer wait times we know that people are not getting the care that they need right away.”

Council voted 12-4 to approve the city’s operating and capital budget for next year.

“We know that people are not getting the care that they need right away.”

Mayor Scott Gillingham had indicated he would stick to the budget’s plan to hire the additional firefighters over four years. However, he said he ultimately agreed the expedited plan made sense.

“There’s an opportunity here for some compromise to make sure that we’re providing our fire-paramedic staff with the resources they need. It’s acknowledging the work of our firefighter-paramedics,” said Gillingham.

The mayor noted the new firefighters will be part of a fully trained resource pool that works in rotation to cover absences, as the budget proposed.

The city will use its financial stabilization reserve to pay for the additional emergency workers hired in 2026.

The mayor said he’s pleased the budget passed after only one final amending motion from council, noting there are typically many calls for changes.

The decision comes after repeated requests from the United Fire Fighters of Winnipeg union to add at least 40 more firefighters in 2026, over concerns a staff shortage is ramping up overtime and raising the risk of burnout.

“The money is already being spent in the most inefficient and harmful way possible (on overtime). The question before you today is whether to keep accelerating burnout, harming our staff, crippling the system that Winnipeg relies on 24-7,” said Nick Kasper, president of the UFFW, during Wednesday’s city council meeting.

“Firefighters are exhausted…. Response times are significantly slower than they should be.”

“Firefighters are exhausted…. Response times are significantly slower than they should be.”

Kasper told reporters the city would be better off cancelling nine new positions slated for a new Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service wellness clinic and using the money to add more firefighters.

“This is a downstream approach that comes into action after people are already sick and injured, and we know that the root cause of the injuries that are being incurred is, in fact, the excessive overtime that’s being worked,” he said.

Council opted to leave the wellness clinic in the budget.

Gillingham said that clinic will focus on ensuring firefighters and paramedics who are off sick can return to work when they are able, as well as prevention efforts to avoid absences.

Prior to the vote, Kasper welcomed any addition in numbers, but said 40 positions in two years falls short of what’s needed.

During the meeting, Gillingham emphasized that the budget is aimed at keeping taxes and fees affordable for Winnipeggers. The $1.49-billion preliminary operating budget includes a property tax hike of 3.5 per cent this year. That follows a 5.95 per cent hike in the 2025 budget, the highest single-year increase since the 1990s.

The more moderate 2026 increase comes as the city embarks on a major $1.19-billion capital spending plan, up from $677 million in 2025.

The North End sewage treatment plant upgrade will eat up much of that spending. To cover its share of the project’s $1.5-billion third and final phase, the city will take on $547 million of long-term debt and seek a combined $944 million from the provincial and federal governments.

Overall, the plant upgrade will cost more than $3 billion.

Coun. Brian Mayes, a former chairman of the water and waste committee, said that funding for a top council priority is a major reason why he supported the budget.

“I would never have thought we would be putting $500 million in on the North End (sewage treatment plant upgrade). I didn’t think we’d get to that during this term of office,” said Mayes (St. Vital).

Other budget changes proposed by council’s executive policy committee Tuesday were also given final approval. As a result, the city will hire a full-time transit planner to expedite adjustments to Winnipeg Transit’s controversial spine-and-feeder bus network, seek federal funding for an “inter-agency crime and incident prevention pilot” project and expand a needle and weapons cleanup program to six more parks and greenspaces.

Another EPC-led change will fund three temporary full-time staff to be devoted to the unsafe conditions response team next year. That team expedites the city’s response to hazardous properties, including rubble-filled sites left behind after fires.

joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca

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