Fire stations, ambulances, lifeguard towers and over 400 City workers — the Long Beach Fire Department presented its 2026 proposed budget Tuesday night to the city council. The roughly $200 million set aside for the Fire Department would make up 5.4% of the City’s $3.6 billion budget for next year.
The Fire Department’s budget saw a 4.7% increase compared to its 2025 budget, and the department says its seen increases in emergency medical calls and emergency transportations, but with more workers hired primarily through youth-training programs, they’ve improved on-scene arrivals (arriving within six minutes and 20 seconds of a call).
The Long Beach Fire Department consists of 18 fire stations throughout the city, along with four within the Port of Long Beach and one at the airport. They manage 10 fire engines, 10 ambulances, five basic life support ambulances, 90 ambulance operators and 26 marine safety staff. The department includes 22 lifeguard towers, eight lifeguard facilities, six fire and lifeguard rescue boats and 175 seasonal lifeguards.
Main Takeaway: (Still) Not Enough Paramedic Units
Fire Chief Dennis Buchanan emphasized an issue the department has been facing for years: they need more paramedic units. Emergency medical calls make up 78% of the Fire Department’s call volume, according to Buchanan, and 10 paramedic units are responding to an average of 178 calls per day.
Rescue ambulances respond to a number of scenarios that a firetruck unit cannot assist in, such as a heart attack or cardiac arrest, a seizure, a severe allergic reaction, blood loss and more.
In March, Buchanan told the city council that “at minimum,” Long Beach needs 11 paramedic units, running 24-hour shifts to keep up with the call volume. The proposed budget does not increase the number of rescue ambulance units, and the department was only able to keep their most recent addition running by increasing ambulance fees.
By increasing its ambulance transportation fees by roughly 30%, which will be passed onto residents who need the service, the department was able to allocate $1.33 million to fund the Rescue 2 Peak Load Unit for next year for 12 hours a day, seven days a week.
Chief Buchanan said that in order to operate the Rescue 2 Unit 24 hours a day, the department would need an additional $600,000. According to City staff reports, the national average for a city is 21,000 residents per ambulance rescue unit. Long Beach is at 55,000 residents per rescue unit.
In March, over 50 firefighters came to a city council meeting to advocate for the need of Unit 2, with most workers emphasizing that even with the additional unit, they’re still understaffed and overwhelmed. The City said it would explore three options to keep the unit going: Measure A funds, the City’s general fund, or the Fire Department’s revenue.
To decrease response times for medical emergencies throughout the city, the Fire Department deployed the Paramedic Assessment Unit (PAU) pilot program, which expands the ranks of those who can serve as paramedics in an ambulance to include fire captains with active paramedic certifications.
Buchanan said this did help decrease response times, but it didn’t help their issue of transportation related cases, since it doesn’t add any ambulances to their fleet. The department will have a full report on the PAU pilot in the next few weeks. In order to keep this pilot program going, the department would need funds from the City, Buchanan said.
Crunching the Numbers
The Long Beach Fire Department’s roughly $200 million proposed budget is broken down into these categories:
- $76.48 million for salaries and wages
- $66.33 million for employee benefits, including $24 million for overtime
- $11.87 million for materials, supplies and services
- $19.76 million for interfund transfers
- $63,488 in capital purchases
Specific proposals the Fire Department is requesting include:
- $633,802 in one-time funds for fire station 19 and 22 facility improvements for the dormitories.
- $500,000 in structural funds to fund critical patient care equipment like hydraulic patient stretchers, stair chairs and CPR devices.
- $400,000 in one-time funds to cover overtime to send firefighters to a mandated nine-month paramedic school to obtain their State Paramedic license, from Measure A.
- $360,000 in one-time funding for background checks, onboarding costs and ambulance operator training academies, from Measure A.
- $330,000 in one-time funds to extend the lease at the temporary fire state 9 for six months, from October 2025 to March 2026, from Measure A. The City is building a permanent fire station 9 in the meantime.
- $100,000 in one-time funds to support inclusive hiring and retention practices with a focus on gender and underrepresented groups.
- $50,661 in structural funds for utility maintenance at the training center.
The department saw revenue increases of $2.49 million from ambulance transport services driven by a rise in call volume, reimbursement from the California Department of Health, and $1.9 million by raising its ambulance fees.
Chief Buchanan said the department is facing possible federal funding cuts that support specialty response equipment and training. They will also be impacted by federal funding cuts to Medicaid and Medicare, specifically in preventative healthcare, substance abuse and behavioral health treatment, which could increase emergency 911 services throughout the city.
Chief Buchanan said the department’s vacancy rate is at 3%, in large part thanks to youth pathway programs that focus on partnerships with local high schools and colleges. In 2024, the Fire Department responded to 84,000 calls for service, roughly 230 calls a day.
