Madison Smalstig
The Press Democrat
(TNS)
Heart attacks, scraped hands, concussions. Before July 16, such emergency calls in Santa Rosa would have triggered the urgent, siren-filled race of a fire truck, navigating traffic and lumbering toward the scene as quickly as its bulk would allow.
Now, crews will arrive first in a much smaller, more agile “squad” vehicle.
Two Chevrolet 3/4-ton pickup trucks – staffed by 12 rotating firefighter paramedics – will roam Santa Rosa, responding to medical calls and assisting fire engines and ladder trucks on other calls.
“Their main role is to respond to medical aids and to reduce the response times for the rest of the fire engines,” Santa Rosa Fire EMS Capt. Chris Matthies said.
Fire trucks may still respond to certain calls, if say the engine is closer than one of the two squad cars. But the pickups, and the two people staffing each one, are meant to cut down the bigger rigs from responding when it may be unnecessary. They proactively drive the city — mostly in areas with a higher call volume — to help pick up response times.
“Driving a 2500 (pickup truck) versus an engine — it’s a lot different,” said firefighter and paramedic Jeremiah Zerello, one of 12 who staff the squad.
A $7.08 million three-year grant awarded to the department in November 2023 through FEMA Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response, is funding the 12 firefighters’ salaries and allowed the department to hire 12 others to backfill their positions.
Jack Thomas, Santa Rosa fire EMS division chief, said the department submitted its grant application last year but the department had identified the need for more firefighters in 2016. The department then had conducted a deployment analysis that rates how quickly and efficiently the agency responds to calls.
“One of the things that came out of that deployment analysis was that we would benefit greatly from putting in service … ‘peak hour quick response units,’” Thomas said, adding that they didn’t have enough money to address that. “We need to find that money.”
Matthies said the department hadn’t tried the squads approach earlier because of budgetary constraints.
“We have not had any additional staffing or additional stations placed in our department since 2009,” he said. “This obviously never would have happened without the vision of the chief to go and look for grants to make this happen.”
The addition of the squads means the Santa Rosa Fire Department meets response standards set by the National Fire Protection Association. One of these is NFPA 1710, which outlines in part the recommended minimum number of firefighters and required response times for various types of emergencies.
The standard calls for at least 16 firefighters responding to a fire in a single-family home.
“We’re below the national average,” Thomas said, referring to the standard.
But with the squads, the department now meets the NFPA standard.
Other agencies in the state, such as Elk Grove, Sacramento and San Diego, have also implemented squads to increase their efficiency.
The Cosumnes Fire Department, which provides fire and ambulance services in southern Sacramento County, added two squad vehicles rather than more ambulances. It was to better their response times because the vehicles were less expensive and fewer staff were needed to have them up and running, Cosumnes Deputy Fire Chief Dan Quiggle said.
“We needed to add something, and it was an opportunity to do something simpler than a transporting ambulance,” Quiggle said. “The physical cost of the vehicle and equipment is less than half of what it costs us to put an ambulance in service, and these squads won’t be delayed in being released from the hospital.”
The same was true for Santa Rosa.
Each Santa Rosa Fire Department squad pickup, including the modifications, costs about $120,000. In comparison, an engine would cost $1 million, and a ladder truck $2.3 million, Santa Rosa Division Chief Fire Marshal Paul Lowenthal said.
The Santa Rosa Fire Foundation purchased the two squad vehicles after it was awarded a grant from Community Foundation Sonoma County. The vehicles were customized with pull-out rows for storing important items like a cardiac monitor, defibrillator and traffic cones.
The two vehicles will be housed at Station 3 in Coffey Park and Station 8 in Roseland.
Assembling the squads
On July 18, two days after the first squad shifts, Zerello got into a squad car for the first time.
“I have no routine,” he said, putting his gear into the vehicle. “I feel naked getting on this thing.”
That morning, before Zerello began his shift, the previous squad firefighters assisted at a fire in a Santa Rosa apartment complex. The two squad members searched the unit where the fire started and an adjacent residence for anyone or pets caught in the fire.
Matthies said this was one of the goals with the squads ― to aid the main responding unit at fires. They could shut down water and electricity to the affected buildings, help get water flowing for the other firefighters and jump in in extreme cases.
“I would say the biggest thing is if there is a known rescue and they’re first, they can go right inside and rescue someone,” he said.
The morning schedule July 18 was wonky because the fire happened during a scheduled shift change. Zerello’s partner for the day was stuck on a previous assignment, which gave him more time to get familiar with the system, log into the tablet and get instructions on how to drive the vehicle.
“There’s no door alarm,” said Doug Lyons, pointing to the feature missing on the truck.
“There’s also no alarm for this not being latched,” he added, referring to the pull out shelves in the back.
“So, don’t forget!” another firefighter chimed in, laughing.
As they pulled everything together, Lyons – wearing Crocs with fire-themed charms — and Zerello referred to different jobs related to the squad with a “squ-” prefix.“Squaptain.” “Squaperator.”
Zerello must now take on different tasks that used to be just for higher-ups, like navigating maps, talking on the radio and writing incident reports.
“They kind of are going to be running independently on all of these calls with each other. It’s going to be a great learning experience,” Thomas said while supervising a medical call. “It’s almost like succession training to becoming a captain someday.”
Zerello responded to two medical calls the morning of July 18. On the first call, a worker near Piner High School sprained his ankle. On the second, a person had suffered a heart attack.
The squad was the first to arrive for both calls, beating ambulances by about a minute.
“Can you wiggle your toes for me?” the other squad firefighter and paramedic Ruben Alvarez asked the patient at the second call.
“I’m going to give you a big hug,” Alvarez told the woman as he and Zerello helped her to a gurney from her wheelchair.
“You guys all good?” Alvarez asked the ambulance operators and medics before they left the scene.
As the two drove back to the station, they talked about how they think the squad will help the department, especially since calls have grown from about 19,000 in 2009, when the department last added new staffed vehicles, to more than 30,000 calls in 2023.
“It’s definitely going to relieve the engines which allows them to deal with the higher priority fires or extrications or whatnot,” Zerello said. “I think it’s going to be a great asset for the department and for the city.”
You can reach Staff Writer Madison Smalstig at madison.smalstig@pressdemocrat.com. On X (Twitter) @madi.smals.
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