StarExclusive: Toronto Fire Services takes longer to respond to emergency calls in disadvantaged areas of the city compared to other neighbourhoods, according to new data from the department.
Toronto Fire Services takes longer to respond to emergency calls in disadvantaged areas of the city compared to other neighbourhoods, according to new data from the department, and councillors warn the pattern could be putting residents in vulnerable communities at risk.
According to the data, on average the department met its target for a key metric called “total response time” in just 70 per cent of incidents in the city’s 33 NIAs and 10 ENs. For neighbourhoods not identified as disadvantaged, the department met its target 80 per cent of the time. The National Fire Protection Association benchmark is 90 per cent.
He said that in general, response times are affected by factors like call volumes, traffic, weather and construction, and noted TFS concentrates equipment and firefighters in high-density parts of town because of “the greater associated life safety risks” of incidents in those areas. Most neighbourhood improvement areas are in the northwest or eastern part of the city, outside the core.
The metric applies to all types of calls, including fires, traffic incidents and medical emergencies. More than half of the calls TFS responds to are medical emergencies, while roughly a quarter are fires. The average percentages at which TFS met the benchmark for that measure were lower in NIAs and ENs, and in 2022 the designated neighbourhoods made up seven of the 10 areas where the department’s scores were the lowest.
In 2021, TFS began implementing recommendations from an operational review that aims to improve response times. They include strategically redistributing trucks and other equipment to react to changing call volumes in different parts of the city.The department also plans to add 52 new front-line staff in each of the next three years, and is exploring building a new fire station in Flemingdon Park.
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