As overtime costs reach $2.8M, plan would see Sudbury hire eight new full-time firefighters

As the municipal budget process nears, staff and city councillors are making their pitch for how the 2024 budget should be spent.

Business cases, as they are formally known, usually involve proposals for new spending. Staff and councillors can propose anything they want, but it has to be approved by the whole city councillor during the budget process.

The biggest budget item for next year is a plan to hire eight new full-time firefighters. The proposal would cost $438,034 next year, rising to $1.3 million in 2028.

The firefighting budget in Greater Sudbury routinely incurs more than $1 million in overtime costs, something that hiring the new firefighters would alleviate, the proposal said.

The city allocates about $900,000 for firefighter overtime each year, but in 2022, the actual overtime budget was $2.8 million.

The eight new hires would “address the significant dependence on overtime to meet historical absences and the minimum staffing requirement of 24 suppression firefighters and one Platoon Chief per shift,” the proposal said.

The new firefighters would bring the city’s total to 120 full-time firefighters, giving the city enough to cover absences.

“This increase in complement of two firefighters per platoon by 2025 would backfill firefighters off each day due to planned and unplanned absences such as vacation, family leaves, illness and WSIB,” the report said.

Greater Sudbury firefighters battle a recent garage fire. The new firefighters would bring the city’s total to 120 full-time firefighters, giving the city enough to cover absences. (Darren MacDonald/CTV News)

“Reducing our dependence on overtime would be beneficial to the health and safety and overall wellness of our firefighters who are working a significant amount of overtime each year.”

As things stand now, the report said there are an average of seven firefighters who are absent.

“This number has its roots in various factors, ranging from planned and unplanned daily absences, such as vacation, short and long-term disability as well as WSIB leaves of absence and mandatory retirement upon reaching the age of 60 and ongoing training requirements,” the report said.

“The chronic dependency on overtime to meet the approved service level underscores an issue of systemic understaffing, rather than just periodic spikes in demand. Operationally, it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain the minimum required complement of 24 firefighters per shift.”

So many firefighters end up working overtime that they are at heightened risk of burnout, leading to more absences.

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“Our frequent absences highlight vulnerabilities in our present staffing, pushing us to rely heavily on overtime each day,” the report said.

“This not only strains our budget but places considerable stress on our firefighters, risking burnout and lowering morale. The consistent demand for overtime places our firefighters at an increased risk of burnout.”

Read all the business cases here.