By BECKY KISER
Hays Post
The city of Hays Fire Department has an annual budget of $2.5 million and Fire Chief Gary Brown wants residents and taxpayers to “know how their money is being spent.”
The fire department’s mission is “to protect the lives and economic well-being of the people of Hays from the effects of fires, accidents and related emergencies.”
In the just-released HFD 2015 annual report, Brown also stressed “the job of the Hays Fire Department is to be prepared, so we do a lot of training.” Firefighters average three hours a day of in-service training, with a total of 8,000 training hours last year.
Hays has a Public Fire Protection Class 3 Rating by the Insurance Services Office and is in the top 9% nationally of the 
48,754 rated communities. Hays is in the top 5% of the 1,200 Kansas rated communities.
The insurance industry determines the risk analysis of the city by evaluating the 911 emergency dispatch system, the Hays water supply and the fire department’s performance to determine fire insurance rates for homeowners and business owners; less risk means lower rates.
HFD responded to 2,251 calls in 2015, 80% of which were Rescue/EMS (Emergency Medical Service) calls. Fire emergencies came in at 13% with Hazardous Conditions at 6%.
That’s in line with national statistics, according to Brown, with 70 to 80% of all fire calls made for rescue/EMS. In 2014, Kansas fire departments reported 8% fire, 63% rescue/EMS and 29% hazardous condition calls for service. Not all Kansas fire departments respond to EMS emergencies.
Brown also highlighted several other statistics from the HFD 2015 report:
On-duty crew arrived at 90% of calls within nine minutes of notification of the emergency to dispatchers- One qualified firefighter on-duty at airport fire station during scheduled or large charter air passenger flights
- Average of 6 duty alarms each day; 6 general alarms each month; and 4 recall alarms a month
- Hosts the Northwest Kansas Regional Rescue Team for building collapse, confined space, trench cave-in, and high-angle rescue
- Mutual Aid Agreements with the cities of Ellis, Victoria and the Ellis County Rural Fire District; the cities of WaKeeney, Russell, Great Bend and Ellsworth; and the Kansas State Association of Fire Chiefs Mutual Aid Network
- Annual operational check and flow test of all city fire hydrants
- Provides fire suppression, fire code enforcement, public fire safety education, fire cause and origin investigation, technical rescue, emergency medical services, disaster preparedness, and airport rescue and firefighting