Analytics, Performance & Innovation
Analytics, Performance & Innovation
Turning Fire Rescue data into actionable insight, stronger performance, and smarter ways to serve our community.
Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue uses data, performance measurement, and emerging technology to better understand how we serve, protect, and prepare our community.
Our Analytics, Performance & Innovation work transforms emergency response and operational data into meaningful information that supports transparency, informed decision-making, continuous improvement, and the delivery of high-quality fire rescue services.
Our work focuses on three key areas:
- Analytics — Transforming emergency response and operational data into meaningful trends, dashboards, reports, and insights that help tell the story behind the numbers.
- Performance — Measuring response times, service delivery, outcomes, workload, and other key indicators against established goals and nationally recognized standards.
- Innovation — Identifying smarter ways to use technology, data, systems, automation, artificial intelligence, business planning, and program development to improve efficiency, decision-making, organizational performance, and service to the community.
Understanding Our Response Times
Response times are measured using the 90th percentile, which provides a clearer picture of service performance than a simple average.
Instead of showing only the “typical” response, the 90th percentile tells us how quickly Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue arrives for 90 out of every 100 calls.
For example, if 90% of calls are reached in 8 minutes and 30 seconds or less, the 90th percentile response time is 8:30.
Using the 90th percentile helps provide a more meaningful view of performance across the wide range of emergency calls handled by the department.
Our response time goals, including the six-minute EMS benchmark, are based on nationally recognized fire rescue standards, including NFPA 1710. These standards help ensure that performance is measured in a consistent and meaningful way.
Benchmarks for EMS and Fire Suppression
| Type of Call |
Call Processing |
Turnout Time |
Travel Time |
Total Response Time |
| EMS Low Risk – 2 FF |
1:00 |
1:00 |
4:00 |
6:00 |
| EMS Moderate Risk – 3 FF |
1:00 |
1:00 |
4:00 |
6:00 |
| Residential Fires – 16 FF |
1:00 |
1:20 |
8:00 |
10:20 |
| Commercial Fires – 22 FF |
1:00 |
1:20 |
12:00 |
14:20 |
These benchmarks provide a consistent framework for evaluating emergency response performance and comparing actual results with established service objectives.
Fire Rescue Statistics & Performance
Emergency response data helps us understand not only how many calls we answer, but also where demand is occurring, how quickly resources respond, how workloads are changing, and where opportunities for improvement may exist.
Fire Rescue analytics may include information related to:
- Emergency call volume
- Fire and EMS incidents
- Response-time performance
- Unit and station activity
- Service demand and workload trends
- Fire prevention activities
- Training and preparedness
- Community risk
- Operational performance measures
These measures help provide a broader picture of how Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue serves the community throughout the year.
Fire Rescue Statistics Summary
For a broader overview of department activity and performance, please view the Fire Rescue Statistics Summary(PDF, 872KB) .
[View the Fire Rescue Statistics Summary](PDF, 872KB)
The summary provides an overview of key Fire Rescue activity and performance measures and is intended to make department information easier for the community to understand and access.
Turning Data Into Better Decisions
Analytics is more than reporting numbers.
By examining patterns, trends, performance measures, and operational demands, Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue can use data to help identify opportunities to improve service delivery, allocate resources effectively, plan for future needs, and better understand the changing needs of the community.
Innovation builds on that work by exploring new technologies, analytical tools, automation, and improved processes that can help Fire Rescue operate more efficiently and make information more useful to both decision-makers and the public.
Together, Analytics, Performance & Innovation help turn information into insight — and insight into better service.
Supporting Community Risk, Standards of Cover & Accreditation
Data analysis plays an important role in Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue’s ongoing Community Risk Assessment, Standards of Cover, and accreditation efforts. These processes help the department evaluate the risks facing our community, measure how effectively emergency resources are deployed, identify changing service demands, and plan for the future.
Analytics supports this work by examining emergency incident activity, response times, geographic demand, unit utilization, workload, service concentrations, population and community characteristics, and other operational performance measures. This information helps provide the evidence needed to evaluate current service delivery and determine whether resources continue to align with the risks and needs of the community.
Community Risk Assessment & Standards of Cover
The department’s Community Risk Assessment and Standards of Cover is a comprehensive document that brings together operational data, community characteristics, risk analysis, deployment practices, response performance, and planning information into a single picture of how Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue serves the community.
At over 200 pages, the document requires extensive analysis and is updated each year by the bureau to ensure that the information, performance measures, service-demand trends, and supporting data remain current.
Analytics helps support that annual process by:
- Analyzing emergency response activity — evaluating call volume, incident types, geographic demand, response performance, and changing patterns of service.
- Measuring deployment and performance — examining response times, resource utilization, workload, and other performance indicators used to evaluate the department’s ability to meet established service objectives.
- Identifying community risk — using data to better understand where different types and levels of risk exist throughout the city and how those risks may change over time.
- Supporting accreditation — providing data, analysis, performance measures, documentation, and supporting information used throughout the department’s accreditation and continuous-improvement processes.
- Tracking trends over time — comparing current performance with prior years to identify emerging demands, changes in workload, and opportunities for operational improvement.
- Supporting future planning — helping department leadership evaluate resource needs, deployment strategies, station and unit activity, and other factors that influence future service delivery.
The annual update is more than a reporting exercise. It provides a data-supported framework for evaluating where we are, how we are performing, what risks are changing, and where Fire Rescue may need to adapt in the future.
View the Community Risk Assessment & Standards of Cover
The full Community Risk Assessment and Standards of Cover provides a detailed look at the department, the community it serves, identified risks, emergency response performance, resource deployment, and the analytical framework used to support continuous improvement and accreditation.
[View the Community Risk Assessment & Standards of Cover](PDF, 21MB)
Supporting Technology Integration & Operational Intelligence
Modern fire rescue operations depend on multiple technology systems working together to capture emergency activity, document patient care, monitor resource deployment, manage staffing, evaluate costs, and measure organizational performance.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation supports the integration, management, reporting, and analysis of information generated by these systems. By connecting operational technology with meaningful analysis, the department can transform thousands of individual records into information that supports leadership decisions, operational planning, accreditation, budgeting, resource deployment, and continuous improvement.
Emergency Response & Incident Reporting
The area supports reporting and analysis associated with the department’s primary emergency response systems, including:
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ImageTrend incident reporting — supporting the management and analysis of Fire Rescue incident information, including both traditional fire and emergency incident reports and medical electronic patient care records (ePCRs).
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Motorola Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) — analyzing dispatch and response information used to evaluate call processing, unit response, incident activity, deployment patterns, response times, and service demand.
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Incident data integration — bringing information from multiple operational systems together to provide a more complete picture of emergency response, from dispatch and unit assignment through arrival, incident activity, and patient care.
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National incident reporting — supporting department reporting requirements and the continuing transition from legacy national fire incident reporting to the National Emergency Response Information System (NERIS).
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Data quality and reporting consistency — helping ensure that operational information is structured, interpreted, and reported in ways that support reliable analysis and meaningful comparisons over time.
Business Intelligence, Dashboards & Performance Reporting
Operational data becomes most useful when it can be quickly understood and applied.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation develops and supports business intelligence tools, dashboards, reports, and executive-level summaries that transform complex operational information into accessible performance measures.
This work may include:
- Power BI dashboards and business intelligence tools
- Emergency response and incident reporting
- Response-time analysis
- Call-volume and workload trends
- Unit and station activity
- Year-over-year performance comparisons
- Executive and management reports
- Accreditation performance measures
- City and departmental performance reporting
- Specialized operational studies
- Data visualization and analytical reporting tools
These resources allow leadership to move beyond individual spreadsheets and isolated reports toward a broader, continuously developing picture of departmental performance.
Staffing, Overtime & Cost Analysis
Operational analysis also helps the department understand the relationship between staffing, service demand, workload, and cost.
This work may include:
- Minimum staffing analysis — evaluating staffing requirements, vacancies, minimum-staffing overtime, and patterns that affect daily operational coverage.
- Overtime analysis — examining overtime usage, trends, causes, distribution, and changes over time.
- Payroll overtime analysis — evaluating payroll information to identify overtime patterns, cost drivers, and the financial impact of staffing and operational conditions.
- Cost analysis — developing analyses that help leadership understand the fiscal impact of operational decisions, programs, staffing models, proposed changes, and service-delivery strategies.
- Staffing-model analysis — comparing available personnel, minimum staffing requirements, schedules, leave usage, overtime, and workload to identify operational and financial impacts.
- Workload and utilization studies — comparing staffing resources with incident activity, unit utilization, service demand, and other measures of organizational workload.
These analyses help move beyond simply reporting how much was spent by helping explain why costs occurred, what operational conditions contributed to them, and what the data may indicate for future planning.
Geographic, GIS & Response-Area Analysis
Not every operational question can be answered by looking at citywide totals.
Analytics can use geographic information systems, response-area analysis, and geofenced studies to examine specific areas of the community and identify patterns that may otherwise be hidden within department-wide statistics.
These studies may evaluate:
- Concentrations of emergency incidents
- Response activity within defined geographic areas
- Station and unit workload
- Response-area and district performance
- Service demand surrounding specific facilities, developments, neighborhoods, or corridors
- Changes in incident activity over time
- Potential impacts of development and population growth
- Travel and deployment patterns
- Community risk
- Emerging service needs
- Geographic relationships between demand and available resources
GIS-based analysis helps department leadership better understand where demand is occurring, how that demand affects Fire Rescue resources, and whether deployment or response strategies should be evaluated.
Training & Organizational Data Integration
Fire Rescue performance is influenced not only by emergency response data, but also by the systems used to manage training, staffing, personnel activity, and organizational readiness.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation supports efforts to integrate information from these systems so that operational performance can be evaluated more comprehensively.
This may include:
- Training activity and compliance reporting
- Integration of training information into business intelligence tools
- Analysis of training workload and departmental requirements
- Connecting training data with broader organizational performance measures
- Developing dashboards and reporting structures that reduce reliance on manually maintained spreadsheets
- Identifying opportunities to improve consistency between systems and reporting processes
Bringing these sources together helps create a more complete picture of organizational readiness and performance.
Research, White Papers & Special Studies
Analytics, Performance & Innovation also provides research and analytical support for questions that extend beyond routine reporting.
White papers, special studies, and issue-specific analyses may be developed to examine:
- Emerging operational concerns
- Proposed programs
- Staffing and deployment strategies
- Technology initiatives
- Service-delivery changes
- Financial and fiscal impacts
- Workload and resource requirements
- Community growth and development
- Specialized geographic areas
- New operational concepts
- Long-term organizational needs (succession planning)
These projects combine operational knowledge, quantitative analysis, research, geographic analysis, cost analysis, and data visualization to help leadership evaluate complex issues and make informed decisions.
Business Planning & Program Development
Analytics, Performance & Innovation supports the development of business plans, business cases, and implementation strategies for new and evolving Fire Rescue programs and initiatives.
Business planning brings together operational data, financial analysis, staffing requirements, community needs, performance measures, technology considerations, research, and anticipated outcomes to help determine how a proposed program can be developed, implemented, measured, and sustained.
This work may include:
- Business plan development — contributing to comprehensive plans that define program objectives, service models, resource requirements, costs, implementation strategies, performance measures, and anticipated outcomes.
- Business case analysis — evaluating the operational and financial justification for proposed programs, services, technologies, or organizational changes.
- Program development — supporting the planning and design of new services from initial concept through implementation.
- Financial and cost modeling — identifying startup costs, ongoing operating expenses, staffing requirements, potential efficiencies, and long-term fiscal impacts.
- Workload and demand analysis — using existing operational data to identify community needs, service gaps, utilization patterns, and populations that may benefit from new programs.
- Staffing and resource planning — evaluating personnel, equipment, technology, training, facilities, and other resources necessary to support a proposed initiative.
- Performance measurement — establishing measurable objectives and key performance indicators that can be used to evaluate whether a new program is achieving its intended results.
- Research and benchmarking — reviewing industry practices, comparable programs, emerging models, and available evidence to support program design and decision-making.
- Implementation planning — helping translate an approved concept into defined processes, reporting structures, data requirements, milestones, and measures of success.
Mobile Integrated Healthcare
One example of this work is the department’s development of a Mobile Integrated Healthcare (MIH) program.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation contributes to the planning and business-development process by supporting research, participating in program-development discussions, analyzing operational and community data, evaluating potential service demand, identifying performance measures, and contributing to the development of the program’s business plan and supporting analysis.
The business-planning process can help define the program’s proposed service model, target populations, staffing and resource requirements, anticipated costs, technology and data needs, implementation strategy, and methods for measuring outcomes.
Mobile Integrated Healthcare also demonstrates how analytics can support innovation beyond traditional emergency response. By using data to better understand recurring demand, community needs, healthcare utilization, and opportunities for alternative service delivery, Fire Rescue can evaluate new approaches designed to connect appropriate resources with the people who need them.
Business planning helps move an innovative idea from concept to analysis, from analysis to a viable operational model, and from implementation to measurable results.
Supporting System Integration & Modernization
As Fire Rescue technology evolves, Analytics, Performance & Innovation helps support the transition from isolated systems toward more integrated information environments.
This work includes identifying ways to connect and improve information generated by systems such as:
- Computer-Aided Dispatch
- Electronic patient care reporting
- Fire incident reporting
- NERIS
- Staffing and scheduling systems
- Payroll and overtime systems - analysis and auditing HR systems
- Training management systems
- Geographic information systems
- Business intelligence platforms
- Departmental databases and reporting tools
The objective is to reduce duplication, improve data consistency, strengthen reporting, and make information available in forms that are useful to both operational and executive decision-makers.
Data Governance, Quality & Standardization
Reliable analysis begins with reliable data.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation helps support data quality, consistency, governance, and standardization across departmental reporting systems. This includes reviewing how information is collected, categorized, stored, interpreted, and reported so that performance measures remain accurate and comparable over time.
This work may include:
- Identifying inconsistent or incomplete data
- Standardizing definitions and reporting methods
- Improving data-entry and reporting practices
- Reconciling information between multiple systems
- Establishing consistent performance measures
- Documenting data sources and methodologies
- Supporting the development of department-wide reporting standards
- Improving confidence in dashboards, reports, and analytical findings
Strong data governance helps ensure that department leaders are making decisions based on information that is consistent, understandable, traceable, and reliable.
Forecasting, Resource Planning & Future Demand
Historical data can help explain what has already happened. Analytics can also help the department anticipate what may happen next.
By examining long-term trends in emergency activity, community growth, development, workload, staffing, response performance, and resource utilization, Analytics, Performance & Innovation can support forecasting and future resource planning.
Analysis may help evaluate:
- Growth in emergency call volume
- Changing geographic patterns of demand
- Future staffing requirements
- Unit and station workload
- Resource utilization
- Potential effects of new development
- Deployment alternatives
- Future equipment and technology needs
- Long-term operational and financial impacts
Forecasting does not predict every future event. It provides leadership with a data-supported understanding of where demand is trending and what resources may be needed to continue meeting the community’s expectations.
Executive Decision Support
One of the primary purposes of analytics is to place useful information in the hands of decision-makers.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation provides executive decision support by combining operational data, financial information, research, geographic analysis, performance measures, and organizational knowledge into concise reports and analyses designed to answer specific management questions.
This work may support:
- Business planning and program development
- Department leadership
- Strategic planning
- Budget development
- Staffing and resource requests
- Operational changes
- Capital and technology initiatives
- Accreditation and continuous improvement
- City management reporting
- Policy and program evaluation
- Special projects and emerging departmental priorities
Rather than simply presenting data, executive decision support focuses on explaining what the information means, why it matters, what is changing, and what options may be available.
The objective is to help leadership move from data to understanding, from understanding to strategy, and from strategy to informed action.
Advancing Technology & Innovation
Technology continues to change how Fire Rescue collects information, deploys resources, evaluates performance, and communicates results.
Analytics, Performance & Innovation helps identify opportunities to improve how systems and data are used across the department through:
- Business intelligence and advanced analytics
- Data integration
- Automation
- Geographic information systems
- Process improvement
- Modern reporting platforms
- Emerging analytical technologies
- Artificial intelligence and AI-assisted analysis
Innovation is not simply about introducing new technology.
It is about identifying practical ways to reduce repetitive work, improve data quality, connect information across systems, identify meaningful trends, strengthen organizational processes, and provide decision-makers with better information when they need it.
Together, technology and analytics allow Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue to turn operational information into organizational intelligence — supporting better decisions today while helping the department anticipate and prepare for the needs of tomorrow.
Public Records & Data Requests
Information presented on this page is intended to provide an accessible overview of Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue operations and performance.
For official public records, datasets, reports, or other records requests, please contact the City Clerk’s Office.
All official public records requests must be processed through the City Clerk in accordance with Florida’s Public Records Law, Chapter 119.