Thunder Bay fire service 'ahead of the curve' in meeting provincial firefighter standards

The chief of Thunder Bay Fire Rescue says the organization is "ahead of the curve" when it comes to meeting new, provincially-mandated minimum certification standards for firefighters.

The province brought forward draft legislation in January, which introduced minimum standards for Ontario firefighters.

The standards, which are based on National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) requirements and will be overseen by Ontario's Office of the Fire Marshal (OFM), will apply to all firefighters, officers, and inspectors, depending on the type of work they do (for example, there are certifications relating to operating pumps, and conducting water, ice, or confined space rescues).

The legislation is expected to come into effect on July 1, and fire departments will have a few years to meet the requirements.

"We're definitely supportive of this regulation from a health and safety perspective," Thunder Bay fire Chief Greg Hankkio said. "It's a good thing having minimum training requirements for the fire service similar to other trades."

Hankkio said Thunder Bay's fire department, which does its own training in-house, had already been training its firefighters to most of the standards already, albeit on a voluntary basis.

"We as a department have have chose over the last number of years to train and actually certify our people to those standards," he said. "What they're saying now is, if you're a department that hasn't been certifying ... now it's mandatory." 

"In that regard, we are ahead of the curve."

Rob Grimwood, president of the Ontario Association of Fire Chiefs (OAFC) and deputy chief of Mississauga Fire and Emergency Services, said there will likely be some cost implications for fire services that hadn't already been training to NFPA standards.

"There are fire departments who are already there," he said. "They chose to go this route on their own, and they simply look at this regulation and say 'been there, done that.'"

"There are other fire departments who are working towards that ... where there might be some minor cost implications," Grimwood said. "Then there are fire departments that are telling us that there's going to be big cost implications because they haven't been training frequently enough."

While that will likely mean municipalities will simply have to direct more funding to their fire services, the OAFC is also calling on the province to provide support.

"There were several things that we heard from our members that that were needed," Grimwood said. "One of those is financial support. Another is improved OFM capacity, so the fire marshal's office actually hiring more staff to conduct training and testing, which they're already in the process of doing."

Grimwood said the OAFC is also asking for changes to the testing process that would give municipalities the authority to handle that internally.