OH Fire Stations' Upgrades to Accommodate Female Members

CLEVELAND—City Council on Monday approved as much as $830,000 in remodeling at Cleveland’s fire stations to accommodate female fire personnel.

The upgrades, expected to be done by 2025, would provide for separate sleeping quarters, bathroom facilities and showers.

“What we’re trying to do is to make each of the stations equitable regardless of gender,” Finance DIrector Sharon Dumas told City Council members.

The legislation would take effect once signed by Mayor Frank Jackson, which is likely this week.

Cleveland’s fire department historically has had very few women. As of 2019, there were just three, with two nearing retirement. One woman is in the department now among more than 700 fire personnel.

That disparity shows in the male-only design of most of Cleveland’s 27 fire stations, Carter Edman, a special assistant to Jackson, told members of City Council.

Six stations will be addressed – at an estimated cost of $85,000 — in the renovations that are expected to begin this year. A larger phase will follow at 16 fire houses. That work, which will be more extensive, is expected to cost about $745,000.

“Different stations require different levels of intervention,” Edman said. “Some are very simple – adding a door or some signage, things like that. Others will be more involved and require new plumbing fixtures and so forth.”

Councilman Brian Kazy questioned whether doing the work was premature, given that several fire houses also have other needs, such as roof repairs.

“Is the money best used accommodating individuals who we don’t have hired yet as opposed to fixing our fire houses that need it now?” Kazy asked.

Those other projects are being addressed as part of the city’s overall capital budget, Edman said.

And Dumas defended the effort to make the fire stations more accommodating as something necessary as Cleveland seeks to recruit more women to the fire department.

A study conducted in 2019 found that nationally only 6% of fire personnel were women. Cleveland has focused on boosting the numbers of women and minorities on its safety forces in recent years.

“Part of the issue in the past is we had no accommodations for them,” Dumas said.

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