Today, Springville City’s fire department is a combination fire department made up of full time, part time, and volunteer firefighters.
The fire department consists of 18 full-time firefighters; 13 part time firefighters and a contingency of “Volunteer” firefighters called “Reserves” who respond and help with large structure fires.
Daily staffing includes 5 full-time firefighters and 1 part-time firefighter. Minimum daily staffing is 4 personnel. All fire suppression personnel are required to be a minimum advanced-EMT.
Administrative personnel consist of a Fire Chief, Assistant Chief, an administrative Captain over EMS, a part time Fire Inspector, and a part time Office Assistant.
We operate out of two fire stations:
Station 41 at 75 W Center
Station 42 at 420 South Canyon Road.
Apparatus consist of
3 Engines (E41, E42, E43)
1 Quint (Truck 41)
3 Brush Trucks
1 Water Tender
1 Rescue
3 Ambulances
We are currently (2024) staffed with six firefighters 24 hours a day.
We are an all-hazards fire department responding to all manner of fires, auto accidents, hazardous materials, ice rescue etc. and deliver EMS (and patient transportation) at the paramedic level.
Our Fire Prevention program includes annual business inspections, and a public education program aimed at the youth in our community, which generally is through fire station tours and presentations.
The Fire Marshal enhances life safety in our city by enforcing local and state fire codes and providing building inspections for new and existing businesses.
Springville Fire Department is an ok place to work. The primary issues stem from city administration. The equipment is good, despite a very low budget for the size of the department. Springville is pretty consistently never 6 handed, minimum staffing is 4, mostly it’s always 4-5 a day. 6 people staff 1 engine and 2 ambulances. If 5 handed, the 2nd ambulance is placed out of service, leaving 1 engine and 1 ambulance for a city of almost 15sq miles and about 40,000 residents.*
Although the community believes we have 2 fire stations, the second station is an unmanned warehouse with the worst apparatus. Because that station is unmanned, the usual 6 people that staff 1 engine and 2 ambulances (if fully staffed) respond out of station 41. This gives a significantly increased response time to certain areas of the city. Every minute lost on response to a cardiac arrest is a 10% decrease in survival. The NFPA has set a standard of 4 minute response time from out the door to a structure fire, half of Springville’s residents are 6-8, some even 10 minutes from the station.
Springville Fire is actually a joined Public Safety department with the chief of police being the director of public safety and the fire chief being the assistant director of public safety. The chief of police is in charge of the fire department. This person asked what battalion chiefs are. The city manager has every city council member in his pocket. He is a politician/lawyer, so he knows how to twist words and manipulate policy. We barely get small items we ask for, like a mechanical CPR device, we do not get large things we ask for, like more staffing or a new station.**
Admin would have you believe that the pay is amazing. While the starting pay for FF/advanced EMT or FF/paramedic is good, it quickly falls behind neighboring departments. Captain and engineer starting pay is not even close to neighboring departments.
Also the city’s HR is entirely useless. You better hope you understand your retirement system because Kathy absolutely doesn’t and WILL blame issues she caused on you. One time, one of our married firefighters had a baby and he called HR to add the newborn to his health insurance, Kathy added the child but removed that firefighter’s wife. He only found out when they got all the bills months later. She also asked a middle eastern person during a job interview “why do your people always blow stuff up.” She’s a terrible person and actively avoids doing her job.
The bottom line is that most Springville Firefighters are embarrassed to tell people where they work. Springville is the laughing stock of Utah County. It could be a very great place to work. The firefighters are mostly all awesome people and dedicated to the job. But like most places, things don’t change quickly.
*Since this was posted, the response model has changed. When we are 5 handed and the 1st ambulance is at the hospital, the captain, engineer and 3rd firefighter staff the 2nd ambulance, leaving an unmanned fire engine. Same goes for 6 handed, if the 1st and 2nd ambulances are gone, the captain and engineer put the engine out of service and staff a 3rd ambulance, even though the engine has medical equipment. Just hope your house doesn’t catch fire when both ambulances are out on a medical.
**Update on this, we actually didn’t even get a CPR device. The department has such a terrible budget that we can’t get a device that was promised months ago. Furthermore, there is no overtime budget so for those of us who are willing to work extra shifts if that shift is short handed, you aren’t allowed to now. This virtually promises that we will be at minimum staffing every day.
So much to say, so little room. While I enjoyed working at Springville, it continually gets worse. City admin is a joke, we’d have to check our paychecks every time to make sure they were correct. HR will hang up on you if you call them. The city manager does NOT care about the FFs and will only do the legally required minimums. There’s a sad joke amongst Springville residents that if you get hurt in town, crawl to Provo then call 911. The FFs do a good job to keep things running, but its basically a $hit show. Also, white fire engines are fugly.
Leadership & Administration:
Where to begin with administration… The repeated instances of incompetence know no bounds. The most recent example was the city authorizing a week-long carnival to be placed directly on the front apron of the fire station.
After the firefighters unionized, everything went downhill. The city manager responded by sending emails to the firefighters threatening funding cuts and making numerous other threats should they choose to participate in collective bargaining or engage in any negotiations with him.
Work Environment & Morale:
The work environment is okay, but it is entirely crew-dependent. It’s every crew for themselves, with no consistent standards across the board. Multiple morale surveys have been conducted, and none of them indicate a positive or happy workplace.
Resources & Equipment:
The equipment is acceptable in that all fire engines and ambulances are similarly spec’d, making transitions to reserve units (which happens often) relatively easy. However, the frontline engine constantly leaks water, whether in or out of pump shift. During the city’s annual parade, one of the fire engines broke down and had to be towed off the parade route.
Staffing & Scheduling:
Springville’s optimal staffing is six personnel: two on a fire engine, two on an ambulance, and two on another ambulance.
If staffing drops below six, the configuration shifts to three on the engine and two on an ambulance. If ProQA determines only one unit is needed, the single ambulance will respond. If a concurrent non-fire (medical) call comes in, the three staffing the fire engine will abandon it at the station to take the second ambulance.
TL;DR:
The firefighters in Springville are solid professionals, but they’re held back by the many issues present within the department.
Springville Fire is an okay department to work for. Springville doesn’t treat its employees very well. Chief Clinton is old and out of date with firefighting tactics and equipment. The firefighters have to try to persuade him and city officials to let us have new equipment and training. The department has started to provide better training but its not a super common thing and leaves firefighters less prepared to do their jobs safely. The station is nice and relatively new but most of the apparatus are old. Equipment is slowly being updated but still could use some help. Springville uses its own fire and Police dispatch and the service that it provides is terrible compared to other avaliable dispatch centers serving bordering cities. We will ask dispatch for resources and commonly will be told that they are busy or taking a 911 and are unable to help us or answer questions. Staffing and response model are interesting as well, its not common to be fully staffed every day. We are usually short by 1 or 2 crew memebers making the workload harder and less streamlined. Each shift captain has a different interpretation of how many units respond to certain calls and how the rotation of calls between units works. When working an overtime shift or trade you will have to figure out what that captain wants and you will likely be “wrong” at some point during that shift as well. Timecards are often messed up as well. Either the department admin changes time punches to what they think they should be or the city HR messes the pay up when it goes through them.
Springville fire has come a long way from when it switched from volunteer to full time but it still has a lot of changes to make before it is a good department. Springville isn’t a career department yet, it struggles to keep firefighters more than a year or 2 before they leave for better pay, benefits or a department that takes better care of its employees. I have watched a lot of firefighters come in the door and leave quickly after seeing how things are run. Most of the shifts have an average experience between all the guys of 2 years. If the city took betger care of its employees Springville would be a great place to work. It has a long way to go before they will have things figured out.
The Fire Chiefs are doing their best. They care about the department and want to improve it, but are severely impeded by the city manager and the chief of public safety. Payroll and human resources are difficult to communicate with; any issues regarding pay stubs, benefits, or retirement contributions will typically take several attempts to be resolved. HR is particularly incompetent and hostile.
The culture of the Department is in a fragile state. There’s a lot of negativity circulating amongst staff, and it seems to be getting worse as time goes on. This is likely because most of the employees feel under paid and under appreciated, and have been voicing these complaints for the better part of two years with little improvement.
Generally speaking, our equipment is sufficient for both fire and EMS. As always, it would be nice to have more, but we have what we need to do our jobs effectively, and our Admin works diligently to maintain that status.
Resources are lacking, primarily due to our dispatchers lack of experience and understanding of Fire Department operations. A prime example of this is that there have been multiple times in recent history where SVFR has been first due to a structure fire and struck a first alarm, and dispatch has had to ask IC (OVER THE RADIO) what a first alarm is, as well as who they should be requesting and from where. In one instance, these types of communication errors led to an 13 minute delay from the time a first alarm was requested to the time that the next due apparatus was dispatched.
On paper, staffing and scheduling are reasonable. However, due to a constant staffing shortage, crews are frequently operating with one or two less people than what is considered “fully staffed”. In my time at SVFR, several employees have left the Department, which is inevitable. The issue is not that people are leaving, it’s that the process for hiring new employees is painfully slow. We recently had an employee leave, and it literally took 6 months for the vacant position to be filled.
Another factor that contributes to crews being short-handed ties back to Department morale. Staff simply aren’t motivated to pick up extra shifts or fill open spots, and there is no incentivization to do so. Other places I’ve worked have offered things like gift cards, movie tickets, cash bonuses, etc, to get people to pick up, and it extremely effective. Additionally, we have the longest FLSA cycle possible (meaning that we have to work 212 hours in a 28 day period before we start getting overtime pay), which further discourages our staff from working extra, because those “overtime hours” will still likely be paid at their standard wage.
Overall, working for Springville Fire & Rescue is alright. We have a workforce that is passionate about what they do, and the Department has a lot of potential to become a destination department. We are still experiencing the growing pains associated with departments that transition from volunteer to full time, and there is a massive lack of support from the city administrators.
Rating Breakdown
1.4/5
2/5
2.2/5
2.4/5
5 Reviews on “Springville Fire and Rescue”
Springville Fire Department is an ok place to work. The primary issues stem from city administration. The equipment is good, despite a very low budget for the size of the department. Springville is pretty consistently never 6 handed, minimum staffing is 4, mostly it’s always 4-5 a day. 6 people staff 1 engine and 2 ambulances. If 5 handed, the 2nd ambulance is placed out of service, leaving 1 engine and 1 ambulance for a city of almost 15sq miles and about 40,000 residents.*
Although the community believes we have 2 fire stations, the second station is an unmanned warehouse with the worst apparatus. Because that station is unmanned, the usual 6 people that staff 1 engine and 2 ambulances (if fully staffed) respond out of station 41. This gives a significantly increased response time to certain areas of the city. Every minute lost on response to a cardiac arrest is a 10% decrease in survival. The NFPA has set a standard of 4 minute response time from out the door to a structure fire, half of Springville’s residents are 6-8, some even 10 minutes from the station.
Springville Fire is actually a joined Public Safety department with the chief of police being the director of public safety and the fire chief being the assistant director of public safety. The chief of police is in charge of the fire department. This person asked what battalion chiefs are. The city manager has every city council member in his pocket. He is a politician/lawyer, so he knows how to twist words and manipulate policy. We barely get small items we ask for, like a mechanical CPR device, we do not get large things we ask for, like more staffing or a new station.**
Admin would have you believe that the pay is amazing. While the starting pay for FF/advanced EMT or FF/paramedic is good, it quickly falls behind neighboring departments. Captain and engineer starting pay is not even close to neighboring departments.
Also the city’s HR is entirely useless. You better hope you understand your retirement system because Kathy absolutely doesn’t and WILL blame issues she caused on you. One time, one of our married firefighters had a baby and he called HR to add the newborn to his health insurance, Kathy added the child but removed that firefighter’s wife. He only found out when they got all the bills months later. She also asked a middle eastern person during a job interview “why do your people always blow stuff up.” She’s a terrible person and actively avoids doing her job.
The bottom line is that most Springville Firefighters are embarrassed to tell people where they work. Springville is the laughing stock of Utah County. It could be a very great place to work. The firefighters are mostly all awesome people and dedicated to the job. But like most places, things don’t change quickly.
*Since this was posted, the response model has changed. When we are 5 handed and the 1st ambulance is at the hospital, the captain, engineer and 3rd firefighter staff the 2nd ambulance, leaving an unmanned fire engine. Same goes for 6 handed, if the 1st and 2nd ambulances are gone, the captain and engineer put the engine out of service and staff a 3rd ambulance, even though the engine has medical equipment. Just hope your house doesn’t catch fire when both ambulances are out on a medical.
**Update on this, we actually didn’t even get a CPR device. The department has such a terrible budget that we can’t get a device that was promised months ago. Furthermore, there is no overtime budget so for those of us who are willing to work extra shifts if that shift is short handed, you aren’t allowed to now. This virtually promises that we will be at minimum staffing every day.
So much to say, so little room. While I enjoyed working at Springville, it continually gets worse. City admin is a joke, we’d have to check our paychecks every time to make sure they were correct. HR will hang up on you if you call them. The city manager does NOT care about the FFs and will only do the legally required minimums. There’s a sad joke amongst Springville residents that if you get hurt in town, crawl to Provo then call 911. The FFs do a good job to keep things running, but its basically a $hit show. Also, white fire engines are fugly.
Leadership & Administration:
Where to begin with administration… The repeated instances of incompetence know no bounds. The most recent example was the city authorizing a week-long carnival to be placed directly on the front apron of the fire station.
After the firefighters unionized, everything went downhill. The city manager responded by sending emails to the firefighters threatening funding cuts and making numerous other threats should they choose to participate in collective bargaining or engage in any negotiations with him.
Work Environment & Morale:
The work environment is okay, but it is entirely crew-dependent. It’s every crew for themselves, with no consistent standards across the board. Multiple morale surveys have been conducted, and none of them indicate a positive or happy workplace.
Resources & Equipment:
The equipment is acceptable in that all fire engines and ambulances are similarly spec’d, making transitions to reserve units (which happens often) relatively easy. However, the frontline engine constantly leaks water, whether in or out of pump shift. During the city’s annual parade, one of the fire engines broke down and had to be towed off the parade route.
Staffing & Scheduling:
Springville’s optimal staffing is six personnel: two on a fire engine, two on an ambulance, and two on another ambulance.
If staffing drops below six, the configuration shifts to three on the engine and two on an ambulance. If ProQA determines only one unit is needed, the single ambulance will respond. If a concurrent non-fire (medical) call comes in, the three staffing the fire engine will abandon it at the station to take the second ambulance.
TL;DR:
The firefighters in Springville are solid professionals, but they’re held back by the many issues present within the department.
Springville Fire is an okay department to work for. Springville doesn’t treat its employees very well. Chief Clinton is old and out of date with firefighting tactics and equipment. The firefighters have to try to persuade him and city officials to let us have new equipment and training. The department has started to provide better training but its not a super common thing and leaves firefighters less prepared to do their jobs safely. The station is nice and relatively new but most of the apparatus are old. Equipment is slowly being updated but still could use some help. Springville uses its own fire and Police dispatch and the service that it provides is terrible compared to other avaliable dispatch centers serving bordering cities. We will ask dispatch for resources and commonly will be told that they are busy or taking a 911 and are unable to help us or answer questions. Staffing and response model are interesting as well, its not common to be fully staffed every day. We are usually short by 1 or 2 crew memebers making the workload harder and less streamlined. Each shift captain has a different interpretation of how many units respond to certain calls and how the rotation of calls between units works. When working an overtime shift or trade you will have to figure out what that captain wants and you will likely be “wrong” at some point during that shift as well. Timecards are often messed up as well. Either the department admin changes time punches to what they think they should be or the city HR messes the pay up when it goes through them.
Springville fire has come a long way from when it switched from volunteer to full time but it still has a lot of changes to make before it is a good department. Springville isn’t a career department yet, it struggles to keep firefighters more than a year or 2 before they leave for better pay, benefits or a department that takes better care of its employees. I have watched a lot of firefighters come in the door and leave quickly after seeing how things are run. Most of the shifts have an average experience between all the guys of 2 years. If the city took betger care of its employees Springville would be a great place to work. It has a long way to go before they will have things figured out.
The Fire Chiefs are doing their best. They care about the department and want to improve it, but are severely impeded by the city manager and the chief of public safety. Payroll and human resources are difficult to communicate with; any issues regarding pay stubs, benefits, or retirement contributions will typically take several attempts to be resolved. HR is particularly incompetent and hostile.
The culture of the Department is in a fragile state. There’s a lot of negativity circulating amongst staff, and it seems to be getting worse as time goes on. This is likely because most of the employees feel under paid and under appreciated, and have been voicing these complaints for the better part of two years with little improvement.
Generally speaking, our equipment is sufficient for both fire and EMS. As always, it would be nice to have more, but we have what we need to do our jobs effectively, and our Admin works diligently to maintain that status.
Resources are lacking, primarily due to our dispatchers lack of experience and understanding of Fire Department operations. A prime example of this is that there have been multiple times in recent history where SVFR has been first due to a structure fire and struck a first alarm, and dispatch has had to ask IC (OVER THE RADIO) what a first alarm is, as well as who they should be requesting and from where. In one instance, these types of communication errors led to an 13 minute delay from the time a first alarm was requested to the time that the next due apparatus was dispatched.
On paper, staffing and scheduling are reasonable. However, due to a constant staffing shortage, crews are frequently operating with one or two less people than what is considered “fully staffed”. In my time at SVFR, several employees have left the Department, which is inevitable. The issue is not that people are leaving, it’s that the process for hiring new employees is painfully slow. We recently had an employee leave, and it literally took 6 months for the vacant position to be filled.
Another factor that contributes to crews being short-handed ties back to Department morale. Staff simply aren’t motivated to pick up extra shifts or fill open spots, and there is no incentivization to do so. Other places I’ve worked have offered things like gift cards, movie tickets, cash bonuses, etc, to get people to pick up, and it extremely effective. Additionally, we have the longest FLSA cycle possible (meaning that we have to work 212 hours in a 28 day period before we start getting overtime pay), which further discourages our staff from working extra, because those “overtime hours” will still likely be paid at their standard wage.
Overall, working for Springville Fire & Rescue is alright. We have a workforce that is passionate about what they do, and the Department has a lot of potential to become a destination department. We are still experiencing the growing pains associated with departments that transition from volunteer to full time, and there is a massive lack of support from the city administrators.