RAVENNA, Ohio — In the past several months, 3News has reported that police and fire departments across the country are dealing with severe staffing shortages. It's the same story in Ravenna, where the fire chief says his crew is experiencing burnout.
Chief Mark Chapple tells us they're short-staffed and overworked, and he needs Ravenna City Council to increase the budget for more firefighters.
"Our call volume has doubled over the last 20 years, but our staffing levels have remained the same," Chapple said.
Ideally, Chapple would like to have 33 firefighters on staff, but right now, the department only has 18.
"How do you keep up with productivity?" he asked rhetorically. "You have to hire personnel, and that's where we're at. We just can't keep up with the call volume."
Wear and tear have become a major issue, especially with each Ravenna firefighter doubling as a paramedic. They work on upwards of 3,500 fire and EMS calls a year, or about 10 per day.
On a weekly basis, Chapple says his team gets overwhelmed to the point where they have to ask neighboring communities for help.
"When you're running 10 calls a day, the likelihood of sleep or rest, even eating, is hampered quite a bit," he shared to further paint a picture. "Then, if we run into a situation where someone is hurt or injured and somebody has to work overtime, then that puts more fatigue on the guys who just came off shift that either have to carry over or work overtime the next day deprived of sleep and rest, which puts a lot of wear and tear on you, and creates almost a burnout syndrome.”
Mayor Frank Semen is in talks with City Council to hire three more firefighters, telling WKYC when he started as mayor back in 2016 the city was almost bankrupt, and it took years to get back to good standing.
"These are our friends and our neighbors, and I firmly believe that we need to do as much as we can for them without giving up the ship,” Semen said. “The last thing I want to do is go backwards again and be in a position where we may have to lay people off. I'm trying to avoid that.”
Ravenna Council President Andrew Kluge said legislators will be discussing budget increases at their Dec. 11 meeting. He expects the budget for the three new firefighter hires to be approved in January.