Humboldt Bay Fire in action. | File photo.

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Humboldt Bay Fire is finally making its way out of a two-year staffing crisis.

At last night’s Eureka City Council meeting, Humboldt Bay Fire Chief Tim Citro provided an update on the department’s current staffing challenges, which began in 2022, and ongoing recruitment efforts. Citro said the department has filled all but three of its full-time staff positions. Now, he’s focused on “positional vacancies” and training much-needed drivers.

Citro | Screenshot

“[T]he lack of drivers in our organization is what’s really creating some of the staffing shortages that we have,” he explained. “So, when talking to our battalion chief of training and our training captains, we are prioritizing getting those firefighters trained up to drive to fill those positional vacancies because each engine company or truck company has to have at least one captain, one engineer and one firefighter.”

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, fire departments across the country have struggled to recruit and retain employees. Between 2022 and 2024, Humboldt Bay Fire lost 17 employees, including several high-ranking staff, to higher-paying positions with the Arcata Fire Protection District and other agencies in the Bay Area, forcing the department to implement temporary rotating closures at its five stations. 

“We’re still recovering from [the staffing crisis],” Citro said. “We’re going to be hiring three entry-level firefighter positions starting in February of this year. We’re scheduling interviews for two weeks from now, and we currently have a list of 14 qualified applicants for three positions. That is not great, but it’s not bad.”

When Citro started his firefighting career in the late ‘90s, he said he was one of 600 fledgling firefighters applying for a job at Humboldt Bay Fire. He’s hoping to boost recruitment through the department’s two-year Cadet Firefighter Program and the Fire Fighter 1 Academy at College of the Redwoods.

“That will give us our own internal hiring pool of local people, so we don’t have to go statewide to try and recruit firefighters to come up here,” he continued. “It’s a really good program and it’s taken off.”

Councilmember Scott Bauer asked Citro to explain how rotating station closures impact response time. In most cases, response time is increased by about one minute, Citro said. 

Councilmember Kati Moulton thanked Citro for the presentation and shared a charming story about a recent interaction she witnessed at the grocery store.

“I was in Winco the other day and I saw a firefighter in uniform … and I kept running into them around the store,” she said. “As I was waiting to check out, I noticed that there were two little kids stalking one of the firefighters, like, following him around. They were telling their dad, ‘Dad, there’s a firefighter in the store!’ and they were so excited to see firefighters in uniform. I just wanted to remind our firefighters and anybody who’s thinking about becoming a firefighter, that you’re straight-up superheroes.”

After a bit of additional discussion, the council agreed to receive and file the report but did not take any additional action on the item.

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