Baltimore fire chief responds to union’s accusations on slow response times, staffing

By Kai Reed

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    BALTIMORE, MD (WBAL) — The Baltimore City Fire Department is so understaffed that it’s affecting response times and transports to hospitals, according to the fire union president.

The fire chief responded to those accusations Monday afternoon.

Baltimore City Firefighters Local 734 Union President Rich Langford has been talking about the issue publicly for months, he even went on national news Monday morning to talk about an incident that happened on Friday.

“It’s something that we’re actually investigating, but that day we had a very, very, very busy day,” Baltimore City Fire Chief Niles Ford said.

Ford called a news conference Monday, addressing Fire and EMS staff shortage and response times after the local fire union president went on Fox News and tweeted about a case involving a 12-year-old hit by a car in Baltimore City, saying it took nearly an hour for an ambulance to respond to a call for transport.

“It does appear that the ambulance showed up about 50 minutes afterwards, but we have to keep in mind that our suppression units are EMTs, and they are paramedics. At the time that they arrive on the scene, they’re there to render care,” Ford said.

“Today, alone, I know of four instances where we had fire engines or fire trucks waiting over 30, 35 — one was even over 45 minutes for an ambulance to get there to take a patient to the hospital,” Langford said.

Langford and Ford agree there is a significant staffing and vacancy issue.

Langford emphasized that the department is about 7% understaffed. He said it is down about 40 EMS personnel and about 30 firefighters.

“Members are fatigued, members are burnt out. They’ve worked so much through this pandemic they’ve just mentally exhausting, so we’re starting to see PTSD and all these other things creep up,” Langford said.

Ford said there are a lot of variables involved — and that it’s not just a Baltimore City issue.

“Fire departments from the east coast to the west coast are actually offering signing bonuses— $1,500, $4,000, $5,000 because it’s so hard to get,” he said.

Ford partly points to COVID-19, saying EMT classes at Baltimore City Community College, for example, haven’t been on a normal schedule.

The city doesn’t offer financial incentives, but Ford said the department is keeping the application process open continuously.

Here’s what he said about whether the shortage is significantly affecting response times.

“It depends on the day and time. There are circumstances I can’t control where people call out sick or something like that that could affect our staffing significantly,” Ford said.

“I think every administrator in the fire department cares, I just think it’s been out on the back burner for some reason over the years but now it’s caught up to everybody and we have to fix it,” Langford said.

Early on in COVID-19 pandemic, the department used private ambulances to pick up slack. They are considering doing more of that in the future. Langford said however, that solution shouldn’t be the way to go.

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