By JOSEPHINE JOHNSON
PHOTO CREDIT Giuseppe LoPiccolo
College Park’s mayor and city council on Feb. 4 agreed to sign a letter to the candidates running for Prince George’s County executive asking for funding to hire 150 new firefighters and emergency medical service staff countywide in fiscal year 2026.
The letter, drafted by the Coalition to Support Prince George’s County Fire and EMS, also asks the 12 candidates, who will face off in a March 4 primary election, to support the group’s efforts to reduce barriers to onboarding volunteer firefighters and to increase transparency between the county Fire/EMS Department and local officials.
The coalition includes government and fire officials from multiple cities in the county, as well as some firefighters and residents.
“We can use this election as leverage to elevate the need for meaningful change, to elevate the conversation,” former Brentwood Vice Mayor Stefan Leggin told the College Park City Council on Feb. 4. “We take it to the top. We want them to know that staffing our fire departments needs to be a top priority.”
The county Fire/EMS Department in June reassigned 55 career firefighters—those paid by the county—from Greenbelt, Berwyn Heights, Bowie and Bunker Hill–to other fire stations in an effort to reduce overtime. Despite pleas from officials from those and neighboring cities for the paid firefighters’ return, the county has restored staff only to the Bunker Hill station.
The letter outlined six recommendations for the new county executive, including reducing barriers to volunteerism, with a suggestion to expand the number of virtual and in-person classes and shorten the time it takes for a volunteer to become certified.
The coalition also asked for a commitment to large-scale recruitment, improved data transparency–including response times, which multiple officials have said they have asked for but did not receive–and a task force devoted to ensuring sustainable staffing.
In addition, the group asked for paid EMS staff to serve only as emergency medical service providers and not in a dual role as firefighters. Finally, the letter called for equal funding for volunteer fire departments.
County Fire Chief Tiffany Green, who said in a letter to the coalition that she received the recommendations from a third party, responded with a list of actions she said the county has already taken in regard to what the coalition’s letter characterizes as “deficiencies.”
In her response, Green did not promise or dispute any of the coalition’s claims, except to explain that EMS-only career positions are “not permitted” by the agreement between the firefighters’ union and the county.
College Park Mayor Fazlul Kabir and other officials have expressed concern that response times have increased since the career firefighters were reallocated in June.
Even though firefighters from College Park’s two stations were not moved–one of them, Branchville Volunteer Fire Department, has an all-volunteer staff–Kabir said the lack of firefighters in nearby stations puts the city at risk.
“We are impacted indirectly by the staffing cut in the surrounding jurisdictions, like Berwyn Heights and Greenbelt specifically,” Kabir told College Park Here & Now, “because our firefighters are busy responding to fire calls in other jurisdictions because they don’t have enough firefighters. … Then, we don’t have enough support” from them for calls in College Park.
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6 RECOMMENDATIONS
A coalition of city and fire officials is asking candidates running for Prince George’s County executive to take the following actions to improve the county’s Fire/EMS Department policies:
- Reduce barriers to volunteerism
- Commitment to expedited, large-scale recruitment
- Renegotiate single-role EMS services
- Improved data transparency
- Facility support for volunteer properties and apparatus
- Establish a task force for efficiency and recruitment