On Wednesday and Thursday evening, MRC public security coordinator Julien Gagnon delivered public presentations in Mansfield and L’Isle-aux-Allumettes on the integration of fire services in Pontiac.
Over the past few months Gagnon has been delivering similar presentations to councils across the Pontiac with information from his research. Wednesday night was the public’s first opportunity to hear the presentation and there will be a third meeting at 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 23 at the Campbell’s Bay RA Hall.
“We’d like to offer some information that has been circulating, trying to [dispel] some of the rumours,” he said at the meeting in L’Isle-aux-Allumettes.
“Obviously a lot of things have circulated, especially at this end of the MRC with fire services. I just want to make sure everybody understands where we are coming from and what we can do as a group collectively to find a solution.”
“The purpose of the meeting is to explain why some form of regionalization is being explored, what would and would not change and how residents can give their input,” he continued. “The goal: faster reliable services across municipal boundaries while keeping services close to home.”
Costs, administrative burden increasing substantially
According to Gagnon’s data, over 23 years from 2002 to 2025, the total budget for fire protection in the MRC increased from $453,546 to $2,651,755.82 (485 per cent). Meanwhile, municipal budgets increased only 199 per cent in that time ($14 million to $41.8 million).
The average age of the firetrucks across the MRC is currently 21.3 years which is up from 18.1 in 2017.
“[There’s] as many as 10 vehicles that may not need to be replaced,” Gagnon said. “If they’re aging more and more, municipalities need to think about replacing them.”
He also said that cohesion in long-term planning could be better if decision-making wasn’t splintered among nine different departments. This applies especially to long-term investments like fire halls and trucks.
“[Municipalities] don’t look at it from a top-down perspective at a regional level, because they only manage their own fire service,” he said. “But if I tell you that the municipality of Fort-Coulonge paid near a million dollars for that firetruck [with financing taken into account], well there are six other firetrucks within a few kilometers. The question should be asked, was that responsible, was it fiscally responsible, was it adequate, was it necessary. Those questions should be asked, I’m not here to answer them.”
Of the region’s roughly 233 firefighters, less than a quarter (50) are available during the daytime on weekdays. Gagnon said that while the overall firefighter numbers are great, the lower daytime availability has necessitated the current patchwork of inter-municipal aid agreements.
“There are nine fire departments in MRC Pontiac and seven of the nine require mutual aid,” he said. “They do not have enough firefighters during the day, during the week because of their staffing, everyone works out of town. We need help. Why aren’t we using help with firetrucks as well? Three of those nine departments actually require that mutual aid 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”
Gagnon added that there’s an increasing administrative burden as well.
“It’s important to consider the role of a fire chief in Quebec is almost becoming an exclusively administrative one,” he said. “In 2025, multi-station responses are the new normal. They’re no longer an option, we’re required to do so. How do we share those costs, that’s the question.”
Following the updating of the Quebec fire code in May 2025, there were changes to how services respond to calls. Gagnon explained that departments are now required by law to call neighbouring municipalities for assistance if they can’t respond with the minimum number of firefighters for a structure fire.
“The MRC is responsible to ensure that the municipalities follow the optimization process, which is essentially ensuring that the quickest firetruck arrives to the scene of a fire no matter where it’s situated, no matter where the municipal boundaries are,” he said.
“Each municipality, based on the history of calls, must give the MRC the number of firefighters it has available [. . .] and the time that it takes those firefighters [to mobilize],” he added later in the talk. “The MRC’s role in that is to ensure that those numbers get met every time there’s a fire call, for the benefit of the residents [ . . . ] Ultimately at the end of the day, if you do not meet those numbers that are self-imposed, the municipality exposes itself to liability.”
Costs also vary wildly between municipalities, depending on numerous factors such as if they contract their service out or have a larger tax base to pay for expenses. For example, Rapides-des-Joachims and Alleyn-et-Cawood residents contract out their fire services and pay 3 cents per $100 of evaluation on these services. Bryson residents pay 22 cents per $100, Fort-Coulonge residents pay 17 cents.
“There’s a big disparity. Obviously we would like to see that more standardized,” he said.
Possible configurations
Gagnon gave several options as far as strategies for integrating services. The first would be to have one central service run by the MRC, with chiefs responsible for various jurisdictions or other duties. The second would be for several municipalities to form a “régie”, or fire services board to govern their operations. The third option would be to expand existing inter-municipal agreements, which would entail the most administrative burden and complexity going down the road.
“What I’ve seen in Quebec, when you have two or three municipalities together, an inter-municipal agreement’s fine. When you get to four, five and six, a régie is a little more realistic, or a little more achievable. When you get to 15, 16, you look at the MRC option.”
He emphasized that the goal was not to erase the individual fire halls but to standardize procedures and ensure efficiency.
“Integration should be seen as strengthening the fire service and not erasing it,” he said.
Currently there are eight fire chiefs across nine departments in the MRC – four full-time and four part-time. Gagnon said that the timing was “kind of right” for a change in how services are structured, as several of those chiefs are approaching retirement age.
Next steps
Councils were asked to nominate candidates for a regional fire service committee, which is expected to study the issue once the new slate of officials are elected. An online survey is available for residents to provide input. Any questions can be emailed to Gagnon at j.gagnon@mrcpontiac.qc.ca.
With files from KC Jordan.
