DECATUR, Ill. (WAND) – When seconds count, life-saving fire equipment may be years away. Some members of Congress are calling a shortage of fire trucks in the U.S. a national crisis.
Fire departments are finding that when ordering new trucks, they may be waiting anywhere from two to four years for them to be delivered. On top of it, costs for those trucks have ballooned over the past decade.
“Thirty-six to forty-eight months,” is how long Decatur Fire Chief Neil Elder expects to wait for a new ladder truck ordered earlier this year. A decade ago, a new ladder truck cost Decatur around $1 million. Now, there is a higher price tag. “It’s going to be $2.1 million,” Elder said.
The truck Decatur is replacing will be 25 years old by the time the new truck arrives.
There used to be more than two-dozen fire truck manufacturers in the United States. Today, three companies control about 80 percent of the production market. Last fall, executives from Rev Group and Pearce Manufacturing defended their companies, saying they have been increasing production and hiring more people.
Several states and municipalities are suing the companies, claiming antitrust violations. While several members of Congress want a Federal Trade Commission investigation.
“Your business models are identical,” Rep. Josh Hawley told the Rev and Pearce executives. “Your customers hate them. They hate your business model. It’s killing them. It’s literally killing people.”
The crisis goes back to 2021 and 2022 when federal COVID relief money came flooding into local governments. Those governments used the money to replace aging fire trucks, creating a backlog that still exists.
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