A dozen years ago, the City of Phoenix fire fleet included 65 fire engines, 23 ambulances and 14 ladder trucks stationed in fire houses spread across the city’s 517 square miles. Its sprawling geography makes Phoenix one of the largest urban cities in the U.S. – and makes fast response times even more challenging.

In 2020, Phoenix firefighters answered an average of 9.1 calls per fire engine per shift. The number of units citywide running more than 3,000 calls per year – considered a crisis level according to national standards – quadrupled to 71!

With a 54% increase in call volume in the last decade, we have only increased our number of firefighters by 2.5%.

In a decade, the City of Phoenix added 300,000 new residents. That’s a city the size of Chandler. Phoenix added just 40 new firefighters and one fire engine during those 10 years.

If the City’s rate of 911 calls continues to increase at its present rate without corresponding new resources for Phoenix firefighters – including new fire stations, new fire engines and more firefighters – we expect 911 response times to grow to 11.4 minutes by 2025.

Phoenix continues to be among the fastest-growing cities in America – and no slowdown in growth is projected. By 2025, the City will have added an estimated half million residents compared to 2010. This new growth alone represents a city the size of Tucson.

While annuals call will have nearly doubled since 2010 and the City will have added 500,000 new residents, the PFD projects to have only 51 more firefighters than it did in 2010. This risks the safety of every resident in the City.

Under current budget levels, in 2030 Phoenix will be an estimated 700 firefighters short of what the PFD needs to effectively keep taxpayers and families safe.