Kirkland Lake fire dispatch could be moving to Timmins

Timmins Police is a step closer to adding another community to its fire dispatching roster. 

The Timmins Police Services board has approved a bylaw for the local communications centre to do the fire dispatching for the Town of Kirkland Lake. The item is now on the agenda at the Aug. 15 Kirkland Lake council meeting for its approval. 

The Timmins Police 911 Communications Centre offers dispatching for police, ambulance and fire for the city and a number of other communities.

Coun. Steve Black, who sits on the police services board, asked if the dispatch centre has the capacity to take on the additional calls.

"I want to make sure that we’re comfortable that this isn’t going to turn around and lead to us to say we have issues internally as a result of the additional calls or anything like that,” said Black. 

The communications manager has said they can fulfill the request, said Timmins Police Chief Dan Foy.

“Our manager confirmed that we have the capacity and the call volume is not such that …. it would cause any issues with our staffing levels,” he said.

Right now, Kirkland Lake's fire dispatch is from the North Bay Central Ambulance Communications Centre, with that agreement ending in 2023. Meeting the National Fire Protection Association standards for dispatchers and an increase in the number of fire calls are a couple of reasons that a town report says other options had to be considered.

Other dispatch centres such as Barrie Fire and Emergency Services and the  St. Catherines Fire Department are not accepting new departments, according to the town report. The municipality also reached out to the Owen Sound Police Service, which has not responded.

"Given the high level of training necessary as well as the need for ongoing skills upgrading, it is more cost-effective to contract dispatch services with Timmins Police Services than to create these services in Kirkland Lake," reads the staff report.

The Timmins 911 Communications Centre is currently doing fire dispatch for 18 communities. Kirkland Lake would be the 19th. 

From 2018 to 2021, the centre had between 1,517 and 1,793 fire calls per year, according to the Timmins Police Service's annual reports. The annual report for 2022 is not available yet.

If approved by Kirkland Lake, the town has budgeted $24,750 this year to change over the dispatching to Timmins Police.

The contract would start on Sept. 1, 2023 and end Dec. 31, 2026.

The cost is based on population and works out to $40,920 per year until Dec. 31, 2024. For 2025-26, the per capita charge increases from 44 cents to 46 cents per person per month, for a total of $42,780 a year.