THUNDER BAY — Three billboards have been put up around the city showcasing the wage differences between police officers, firefighters, and paramedics.
Paramedics are at the bottom of the pay scale.
Kyle Stamler, chair of Unifor Local 39, said the billboards went up as part of an education campaign on how difficult it is to keep paramedics in the city.
"One of the things our members tell us that they hear on calls is, 'oh my gosh, what took you guys so long to get here?' or 'You guys must be really busy.' We are a busy service, but one of the things nobody's talking about is our inability to retain staff.
"We have a huge retention problem - we don't have enough paramedics to work the ambulances."
Stamler said there are 72 full-time paramedics, a full complement for the service. However, many can be off at any given time. Vacant hours are filled by part-time staff, many of whom are working full-time hours.
"We have many members on leave. It's a stressful job, physically, emotionally, mentally.
"We do have, at any given time, probably between five and ten per cent of our workforce off."
The City of Thunder Bay has been responsible for Superior North Emergency Medical Services (SNEMS) for over 20 years.
"We have consistently been below, 15 to 25 per cent, below other emergency services and it's across the province," Stamler said.
"They're pretty fed up. They're ready to get the money that they deserve."
Stamler is hoping the billboards will bring the conversation to city council for the next round of budget talks.
"We're hoping to spark a high-level conversation between councillors and senior city administration. It's council that directs administration on how to spend taxpayer funds.
"City councillors might not be aware of this wage discrepancy either. We're hoping that maybe they will talk to senior administration and say, 'Hey, we need to allocate more funding here for paramedics because we're losing medics."
Stamler said the billboards show a large pay gap between the different pay offered to a constable, class-one firefighter and paramedic, all in year eight
At $42.79 an hour, this is the top pay for paramedics. Police and fire earn $8 to almost $11 more an hour and continue to rise, with retention pay built into their salaries.
In 2022, SNEMS hired 17 new staff members, but since then have lost 11 members.
"We lose a lot of our staff to city fire," Stamler said.
"We lose some staff to city police, OPP, NAPS, and oftentimes our members already have a university degree. So they go back to university for a year or two and go to finish off maybe a nursing degree or become a nurse practitioner or physician's assistant and get jobs within a related field."
City manager Norm Gale provided the following statement: "The parties are commencing bargaining, and the city is committed to negotiating fair wage increases for our paramedics. We value and respect paramedics for the work that they do."
Coun. Mark Bentz is the chair of administrative services, which oversees the city's budget. He believes the union is trying to bargain publicly by putting up the billboards.
"I don't think these signs will make this a primary budget item for us, no."
Bentz was asked if raising paramedic wages is possible from a budgetary standpoint with the city.
"Well, anything's feasible if people want to pay more taxes for sure, I guess.
"Parity is not something that I support."
Bentz questioned what the trends are in other municipalities.
"What are the trends in the province? That's what we look at and at this point in time when you compare the work, police work is a much more dangerous job and I think that's probably why you see the difference in pay."
Stamler noted that paramedics also face dangers on the job.
"Paramedics face the same dangers as police and fire – same scene, same call. If it's a working fire, there's an ambulance on the scene.
"If it's a stabbing or shooting, there's an ambulance on the scene. The dangers don't go away because we're in a different vehicle.
"Often, there are no police to send. Police are quite busy in this town. So paramedics are sent to a call where there might be no backup, there might be weapons, unseen guns, knives, and police are not able to help and respond to us. So there's a lot of danger."
The billboards also come as the union is starting negotiations for a new contract as the most recent one expired at the end of March.
Stamler said negotiations have only just started.
