Tom Hernden, Manistee Fire Department chief, presented an annual recap of the department’s 2024 activities this month. to Manistee City Council members on March 18.
Staff responded to 1,272 incidents last year. There are eight members on staff.
“They’ve really done a lot of work this past year and accomplished a lot of great things,” Hernden said.
More than fires
While it is a fire department in name, Hernden’s team doesn’t get many fires compared to during other times in history.
Hernden’s report showed 22 fires compared to 1,068 rescue-EMS type calls in 2024.
“A common question that I typically get is ‘Hey, how many fires do you have in a year?’ … And the answer to that is, ‘It’s not a lot,’” he said.
The main types of fire calls are structures, vehicles, grass or brush fires.
“We don’t do a ton of firefighting anymore. Over the course of history the amount of structure fires have come down over the years due to code enforcement, just safer and more effective policies,” he said.
The department has advanced life support ambulance services in the city. Most other fire department ambulances in the county are at the basic life support level with emergency medical technicians.
“An ALS ambulance is the highest level of ambulance service that you can achieve,” Hernden explained. “How we do that (is) we staff our two paramedics, which is a very high level of service for what we have.”
The department’s EMS division also handles well-being checks and lift assists.
There are fire, EMS and prevention divisions within the department, and each division has a different set of duties to cover.
“What we’ve done is we’ve expand(ed) the level of services and the different types of things that we provide so you get the most bang for your buck out of your fire department,” Hernden said of the changes in the department’s focus over the years.
The prevention division focuses on fire inspections, code enforcement, reviews of commercial building plans and educating residents.
The division also conducts public education and fire inspections of businesses each time a business is registered in the city.
