Police and fire service in Kamloops are getting a boost this year, as part of supplemental budget items approved by council.
Kamloops Fire Rescue will be hiring two new full-time firefighters, at a cost of $200,000, which the city says will reduce costs for vacation coverage.
Councillor Bill Sarai says KFR is an “aging workforce” and vacation time has been getting harder to fill.
“Overtime cost was getting more and more difficult not to pay but to backfill. And I think this is a really good move on our part to approve this cost,” he says.
“But I see this probably coming back to every council every year, for additional costs, as our KFR crew gets up there in age and there’s going to be more and more retirements. But this is something for the safety of our community that is not even debatable, the way the numbers match up.”
Councillor Denis Walsh suggested these additions are more about mental health leave and stress leave for some members of KFR.
“And I wonder if this is more of a band-aid solution, rather than working at what is causing this, what looks to be a new issue that we haven’t had in the past 10 years or so anyways, that there’s a lot of people having to be replaced on shift. So if it’s due to sick leave or stress leave, I think we should be having a look at what’s causing that increase that’s causing us now to hire more people.”
Mayor Ken Christian agreed with Sarai, that hiring up at KFR will likely be an ongoing ask.
“It’s an aging workforce, and I think it’s also a growing city… When you are developing and growing, these are the costs of doing business as a local government. So I think we need to support this request.”
Meanwhile, council has also approved hiring a crime analyst and a financial clerk at Kamloops RCMP. A study will also be done this year about upgrades that are needed at the Battle Street police detachment.
Kamloops council approved 13 supplemental budget items on Tuesday, out of 15 that were requested. That now brings the projected tax increase for this year to 0.93 per cent, or $20.72 for a home with an assessed value of $469,000.
