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Section Ten: Historical Perspective <br /> <br /> Table 10.1 Comparison of Staff'mg, Population, and Calls for Service 1981-2003 <br /> <br /> 1981 106,100 2,822 152 1.4326 45 <br /> 2003 143,910 13,392 156 1.0840 43 <br /> % Change 35.64% 374.55% ' 2.83% -24.33% -4.44% <br /> <br />* Thc number of total calls differs from that found in Section Four, because this table is calculated from thc department's Fire <br />Incident Reporting System, which includes only those calls responded to by fire apparatus. Therefore ambulance calls to areas <br />not part of our EMS first response service and those calls which do not require a response by one of our fire companies arc not <br />accounted for here. <br />Thc measure of fircfightcrs per 1,000 population served is ot~cn stated as a reasonable <br />comparison of fire departments and their relative staffing levels. However, the methods used to <br />calculate this ratio can vary considerably, so department-to-department comparisons may not bc <br />particularly accurate or useful. In addition, this measure does not consider other important <br />variables such as area served and community risk. What is useful, however, is calculating this <br />ratio for a single community and its fire department over a period of time to show changes in <br />relative staffing strength. <br />These numbers further illustrate the difficulty of maintaining an effective level of service by <br />spreading existing resources more and more thinly. The need for increased staffing is clear if the <br />department is to improve response times or even to prevent further deterioration of response time <br />performance. Specific recommendations for additional staffing are detailed in Section Twelve. <br /> <br /> 77 <br /> <br /> <br />