New emergency dispatch system will see higher call volume for MFRD in 2016

The Merritt Fire Rescue Department (MFRD) saw a busy 2015, fighting many more fires than it has in recent years.

The number of structure fires, grass fires and car fires MFRD responded to last year was much higher than the numbers from 2013 and 2014, according to the department’s three-year comparison.

Last year, the fire department responded to 12 structure fires, double the six it responded to in 2014 and four more than the eight it attended in 2013.

MFRD responded to 18 wildland fires during 2015 compared to just eight in 2014 and nine in 2013.

An even more dramatic increase is the three year high in the number of car fires MFRD responded to.

In 2013 the fire department responded to just six, in 2014 that number doubled to 12 and that number nearly doubled again last year with a total of 22 vehicles going up in flames. Many of these were cases of arson.

“We’ve had much slower years and much busier years, so we just try to tow the line,” Fire Chief Dave Tomkinson told council at a budget meeting last week.

City of Merritt financial director Sheila Thiessen said the fire department’s operating budget for 2016 is slightly more than last year’s, but it typically hovers around the $950,000 mark. In 2015 the budget was $938,000 and this year’s is budgeted at $960,000.

MFRD went a bit over its operating budget last year, but those costs were offset by provincial reimbursements the department receives from attending highway accidents, Thiessen said. The increase to their budget this year is also expected to be covered from these revenues.

“We keep the funding fairly consistent and that seems to have worked well in the past,” Thiessen told the Herald.

Tomkinson said $85,000 alone was reimbursed from sending out the fire department’s rescue truck to these calls last year.

The total number of calls the fire department responds to on an annual basis has been on a steady rise over the past three years. Last year, MFRD responded to 393 calls for service compared to 353 in 2014 and 273 in 2013.

These numbers stand to increase this year as MFRD is now using new dispatch software that will send them to more first responder calls.

With this system, a call that comes to ambulance dispatch is coded and digitally sent to fire dispatch in Kamloops and relayed to MFRD. Previously an analog system was used, which was longer process, said fire prevention officer Sky McKeown.