City Manager Dallin Kimball told the Prescott City Council on Oct. 14 that staff are advancing multiple public-safety items in the city's strategic plan, including sites and contracting for two new fire stations, a new training tower, targeted temporary staffing to reduce response times and continued work to fill newly authorized police positions.

The update asked the council to consider contracts for design, land purchase and construction of a training tower and noted that staff have identified sites for two strategically located stations. "We have settled on sites for both of those, and they are right in the bull's eye of our coverage maps, which is gonna improve our response times," Fire Chief Holger Dura said.

Why it matters: The strategic-plan goal discussed by staff is to have 90% of fire responses within eight minutes. Council members and staff said the combination of new facilities, a temporary 40-hour engine company and technology upgrades is intended to move that metric.

What staff reported: Dura said the department placed a "40 hour additional engine company in service starting on August 18. So engine 76 is actually in service part of the time about 2 and a half years prior to the fire station being built." That temporary company is quartered at the training center on Sundog Ranch while construction and site purchases proceed. Dura also described a planned training tower made from corrugated shipping containers that can be relocated later if training facilities move.

Dura described two planned stations by name and location: Station 73 planned near State Route 89 and the Fippin Trail roundabout (noted as a relocation of the airport fire station'with airport-specific ARF and operations to remain under FAA funding) and Station 76 near State Route 89 and Prescott Lakes Parkway adjacent to the Peavine Trailhead.

On systems and dispatch, Dura said staff are working with the regional communications center (PRCC) to improve triage and computer-aided dispatch and to replace a legacy sequential toning station-alerting system. He said the new alerting would "reduce the workload of the dispatcher by automatically dispatching based on the information they enter into CAD, and we're expecting approximately 15 to 20 second saving in that total response time." The replacement is described as an efficiency measure to shave seconds off total response times.

Police staffing and downtown policing: Police leadership reported incremental staffing gains and an expanded community-policing footprint. "We have actually 3 new officers who have completed their field training recently," Police Chief Bonney said. The department also has a lateral officer from Scottsdale starting soon and seven recruits at the academy who are expected to graduate in December; staff estimated those recruits could be solo officers around May 2026.

Chief Bonney said a November 2024 ballot measure (referred to in the presentation as Prop 478) added 14 sworn positions, bringing the authorized strength to 99 sworn officer positions. "By the end of this fiscal year, do I believe we're gonna be at that position filled? No, I don't. I think that's gonna take us probably closer to 2 years to fill those positions," she said, adding later that the department expects the positions to be filled closer to 2027.

The police presentation described increased downtown community policing (bike-patrol and school-resource officers augmenting community services) and 16 targeted enforcement actions over recent months, plus development of a traffic-safety section and a newly hired commercial-vehicle inspector.

Airport and coverage: City Manager Kimball and staff described airport-related improvements, including land acquisitions for safety buffers and an FAA-funded ramp for wildfire operations. The council packet previewed the airport as part of the public-safety picture.

Cellphone coverage: Kimball displayed the most recent FCC coverage map and said that, within Prescott city limits, "it's 95 to 98% covered" on an "eyeball estimate," with remaining gaps on the north side and around the Granite Dells.

Council questions and next steps: Council members pressed for measurable trend charts rather than point-in-time snapshots. Kimball and staff said they plan to publish performance metrics and dashboards in OpenGov and to link level-of-service measures to budget decisions. Fire, police and public-works staff said they would return with contract documents, scope of work and follow-up performance data as projects proceed.

Ending: Staff described near-term steps (temporary engine deployment, CAD/alerting procurement, contract steps for station sites and training tower) and longer-term recruiting and facility timelines. Councilmembers and staff said they will continue to track response-time trends and provide updates as bids and contracts move forward.