NH Fire Chief Pushes for Bigger Budget, More Staff

Feb. 13, 2018
Portsmouth's chief is seeking a 3.24 percent budget increase along with four additional firefighters.

Feb. 13--PORTSMOUTH, NH-- Fire Chief Steve Achilles is advocating for a 3.24 percent Fire Department budget increase, to $8.9 million, as well as requests for four new firefighters, a fire inspector and a full-time administrator.

Achilles is scheduled to present his FY '19 operating budget to the Fire Commission Tuesday night and said the proposed 3.24 budget increase will fund current staffing, deployment of all current resources and pay for contractual obligations. The contractual obligations comprise 94 percent of the Fire Department budget, he said.

Current operations, said Achilles, includes the same staffing the Fire Department has had since 1998.

"We're still staffing the Fire Department the way we were 20 years ago and it's pretty obvious we're not the same community we were in 1998," he said.

Because of that, Achilles said firefighters are "barely keeping pace" with an increased demand for services, overlapping calls, growth and development, as well as future impacts from proposed development. He said 3.2 million square feet of new construction was added in the city during the last six years, all of which comes with need for fire and ambulance services.

In addition to the budget increase, Achilles will also seek support from the Fire Commission Tuesday for the additional staffing. He said the new fire inspector position would add another $104,000 to the annual budget, or 1.2 percent. Achilles said the inspector's salary would be $66,000 to $70,000, plus costs for insurance, leave at termination fund, retirement and other benefits.

Achilles said the need for an additional fire inspector is directly tied to growth. He said the Fire Department has been inspecting proposed and new construction and hasn't been getting to existing multi-family buildings.

"We've been trying to maintain for the last couple of years, but we've been falling behind," he said. "We're under a lot of pressures to maintain what we do now."

The fire chief said he also seeks support for the hiring of four new firefighters which would increase the budget by about two percent, if factoring in a reduction of overtime. He said if two firefighters were hired in July and another two were hired in January, the budget would increase 1.63 percent.

Achilles said there are currently 14 firefighters on duty for every shift and his four-year goal is to increase those numbers to 16 per shift. Four new firefighters would bring the staffing level to 15 per shift and offer "two floaters," he explained.

The fire chief will also ask the Fire Commission to support increasing a part-time administrative position to full time. He said that person supports fire prevention and helps with ambulance billing. The financial impact is less than half a percent of the overall budget, he said.

The Fire Department budget hearing will be on Feb. 13 at 5:30 p.m. at station 2, located at 3010 Lafayette Road. The meeting will also be filmed and uploaded to the city's YouTube channel.

"We're hoping members of the community come to the meeting," Achilles said. "There may be discussion and revisions taking place over the next few months."

After the chief's budget is reviewed by the Fire Commission, it goes to the City Council.

___ (c)2018 Portsmouth Herald, N.H. Visit Portsmouth Herald, N.H. at www.seacoastonline.com/portsmouthherald Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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