After days of number crunching and belt tightening brought on by requests for a smaller budget from several of its constituent cities, Eastside Fire & Rescue brought forth a new budget last week.

City officials from Issaquah, Sammamish and North Bend sent a letter requesting that EFR keep its budget increase at less than 5 percent.

The request came following last year’s increase of just over 7 percent and a tougher economy.

Last year’s increase was chalked up to several new hires; typically the department increases are right around 5 percent, Chief Lee Soptich said.

The letter from the cities recommended that the department cut about 5 percent from its non-salary budget to keep the increase to under 5 percent. However, since the non-salary side of the budget is only about 20 percent of the total budget, the department was forced to cut just over 10 percent from it, or about $300,000.

Non-salary items include programs and equipment.

“Only in government can you have cuts that are really increases,” Board of Directors Chair Ron Pedee said.

The new budget just squeaked under the 5 percent mark.

“I heard ‘Less than five percent,’ which to me meant 4.99,” Finance Chief Dave Gray said.

The department heads will spend the next weeks before the next Board of Directors meeting, deciding precisely which programs will be cut and how much funding will be taken away.

One practice that the department won’t continue is hiring new employees in advance of retirement or other predicted leave.

“There’s some risk in that,” Chief Soptich said.

In the past, EFR has hired new firefighters well in advance of any permanent departures, so the new hires can have time to train and make a smoother transition, Soptich said.

Staffing a fire department is always a fine line. Understaffing can cause slower response times as well as high overtime costs. Due to several unexpected extended leaves this year, including new babies, injuries and a military deployment, EFR has already gone through about $400,000 this year in overtime costs, only slightly under the year’s budget of $600,000. This is still well under the amount spent annually several years ago, which used to reach up to $1.2 million.

Currently the minimum staffing goal is three firefighters per station at each of EFR’s nine stations, including the four in Issaquah and three in Sammamish.

The current drain on overtime is expected to lessen shortly, as six new firefighters were just released for duty. However, this may be just a temporary reprieve as retirements later on in the year will again strain the overtime hours.

In addition to program cuts, the department is also delaying the purchases of some equipment including radios to be used when fighting wildfires, as well as multimedia equipment for training.

“The question is, do we eliminate a program or a position?” Deputy Chief of Planning Wes Collins said. “(Either way) we are cutting something way back.”

The Board of Directors will meet again on Aug. 12 at 4 p.m. at the EF&R Headquarter station on Newport Way.

Kyra Low can be reached at klow@reporternewspapers.com or at (425)391-0363, ext. 5052.