The city has a lot of options to consider for the future of the West Bend Fire Department, including potential staff increases, personnel restructuring and what fire stations to continue running.
The city’s Common Council received a presentation Monday on the Fire Department organizational study and operational review from McMahon Associates. The city retained the firm to perform that study, which was completed and submitted in November.
“Over 10 years, you had a 40 percent increase in total calls for service,” Robert Whitaker said of the WBFD. Whitaker was a member of the McMahon team that evaluated the WBFD, and is also himself a fire chief for the North Shore Fire Department. According to Whitaker’s presentation, West Bend had a total of 3,903 calls for fire and emergency medical service in 2016. In 2020, there were 4,382.