The city's latest quarterly report shows the fire department is reaching emergencies faster more often, but the city still has no numbers on ambulance service.
The latest quarterly report shows the fire department's average response time is 8:13, which is well within the target of reaching all calls within nine minutes 90 per cent of the time. The average for 2009 was 9:59 and the number has been above the nine-minute standard for each of the last four years.
The report continues to have no data on ambulance crews however, something that has been a concern for Mayor Nolan Crouse since the provincial transition in 2009.
Crouse said the fire numbers are encouraging and he is glad they're moving in the right direction, but he wants solid numbers on ambulances.
"My biggest concern isn't with fire, it is the emergency response with ambulance, which is being dispatched out of a different centre."
Since the province took over ambulance services, two city ambulances have been under contract to deliver ambulance services in the city and surrounding area.
If there are more than two calls at any given time, a third ambulance is brought in from Edmonton.
Since February of this year, the ambulances are dispatched out of a central dispatching centre in Strathcona County. The city doesn't have access to response time data.
Crouse said the city is meeting with Alberta Health Services about the issue later this week and wants to know what the numbers reflect.
"I am hearing things anecdotally and our staff are also telling us that they have concerns and Alberta Health Services is not providing any information one way or the other."
Trevor Maslyk, executive director of operations for the Edmonton zone, said the city will be getting the numbers this week.
He said Tuesday he wanted to make sure the mayor received them before the media and declined to release the numbers to the Gazette.
Fire numbers
City Fire Chief Ray Richards said he is also interested in hearing what the ambulance response times are, but he is also pleased at the better numbers from fire crews.
Richards credited the improvement largely to the opening of fire hall No. 3 in the city's north end.
"I am not terribly surprised that the number is down, given the travel distance in the city, but it is something we have been working on for several quarters now."
He said the department has emphasized the importance of recording the information and has brought in new dispatch procedures that are trimming down the time it takes for firefighters to respond.
"It kind of puts people on standby so that they can get prepared to get going and rolling even while the call taker is still getting all the details on the fire."
Richards said they also focus on another measure of response times, called the effective response time, which measures the time it takes for crews to get water on a blaze.
That standard is 12 minutes and Richards said it's about getting the right number of resources to the scene, include the city's aerial truck.
"It has to do with the time we get there to get water on the fire and reduce the temperature so that if anyone is still in the fire, they have a high survival rate."
He said the fire department meets that standard between 80 and 75 per cent of the time, but the aerial presents a challenge because it can only be housed in fire hall No. 3.
"It is a bit of a challenge if we had to run to Campbell Park, as an example."
