Editorial: Fighting fire with money

Saturday, Jan. 21, 2006 | 8:15 a.m.

A North Las Vegas Fire Department analysis shows that the agency is understaffed and, as a result, firefighters cannot respond to emergency calls fast enough.

According to a recent story in the Las Vegas Sun, the in-house study shows that firefighters and paramedics arrived at the scenes of priority emergency calls in fewer than four minutes only 51 percent of the time. The National Fire Protection Association recommends arriving in that period of time on 90 percent of such calls.

None of the delays has resulted in a death, North Las Vegas Fire Chief Al Gillespie said. But the potential for a tragedy is high. A fire doubles in size for every minute it burns unattended. A person who suffers a heart attack suffers irreversible brain damage from a lack of oxygen within four to six minutes, the report says, using figures from the American Heart Association.

Gillespie wants to add 50 more firefighters and administrators to his 147-member staff. The department already plans to use a $1.4 million federal grant to hire 15 firefighters who will be assigned to a station opening later this year in the city's northeast region.

Gillespie told the Sun that this spring he will ask the City Council for a 25 percent increase, which would bring the agency's annual budget to $27 million. North Las Vegas also needs to build a fire station to serve a growing number of calls in the city's southwest area, the report says.

The department has shifted some schedules to increase the number of firefighters at six stations, but it is a temporary fix. The agency's analysis is persuasive in showing a fire department that is stretched too thin to adequately cover a rapidly growing city. City officials should seriously consider its findings.

Residents are entitled to expect certain services from their local government, such as clean water, police protection and help when there is a medical emergency or a fire. It is difficult to adequately offer such services in a fast-growing city such as North Las Vegas.

But budget concerns don't offer much comfort to a resident whose home burns down or whose loved one doesn't recover from a medical emergency simply because the fire truck couldn't get there a minute sooner.