Policy - Facilities

Format. Adopt as a policy approved by the fire chief (or by the council or board where the municipality owns and manages the buildings and its framework requires it), or restate it as a directive. Keep the numbering, because the program, the procedures and the audit checklist refer to it.

Drafting conventions. Shall is mandatory. Should is expected unless a documented reason exists. May is permitted. Placeholders in double curly braces, such as {{Department}}, are completed by the department. Drafting notes sit in callouts and are removed before adoption.

Keep intact. The inspection cycle (5.1), exhaust capture and the no-idling rule (5.2), zoning and the rule that gear never enters living areas (5.3), lockout before any work on energized systems (5.5), the electrical prohibition (5.6), the environmental register and the members’ right to know what is in their building (5.11), the safety-critical turnaround (5.15) and the hazard reply rule (5.16). Adapt the titles, the turnaround times where the municipality commits to faster ones, the station-by-station decisions (pole holes, kitchen interlocks, capture or filtration) and the records system.

1.1 To state {{Department}}’s commitment that every station, shop, training ground and office is run as a workplace: inspected on a schedule, kept free of exhaust and contamination where members live, safe to work in and on, honest with members about what is inside the building, and fixed when a member reports a hazard.

1.2 To assign accountability for that commitment to the line and to the municipality’s facilities function under a written agreement, with verification by the health and safety officer and consultation with the joint occupational health and safety committee.

2.1 This policy applies to every building and site the department uses: career and volunteer stations, shops, training grounds and towers, offices, storage buildings, and shared or leased premises.

2.2 It applies to members, to facilities staff and contractors working in those buildings, and to visitors.

2.3 It covers the building and its systems: exhaust capture, zoning, decon rooms and laundries, shops and lifts, electrical, stairs and pole holes, kitchens, dormitories and alerting, fitness rooms, breathing air compressors, generators and fuel, environmental hazards, emergency plans and security. Training props are inspected under SWP - Training Tower and Prop Inspection; apparatus under the apparatus policy.

• Arc flash: the release of energy from an electrical arc, capable of burns and blast injury, assessed under the workplace electrical safety standard (CSA Z462:24).
• Competent person: a person qualified by knowledge, training and experience to do the work safely and to recognize its hazards.
• Hazard report: a member’s report of a hazardous condition, by any route, which enters the register the same way an inspection finding does (Form - Hazard Report).
• Learning firewall: the rule that information gathered for learning is never used as the basis for discipline, and that conduct concerns go to a separate process run by different people (The Human Factor, 2026a).
• Lockout: isolating every energy source of a machine or system, locking and tagging each isolation point, and verifying zero energy before work begins (CSA Z460:20).
• Psychological safety: the shared belief that it is safe to speak up, ask, admit error and challenge (Edmondson, 1999)DOI.
• Qualified electrical person: a person trained and authorized to work on electrical equipment who understands its hazards and controls (CSA Z462:24).
• Safety-critical work order: a facilities repair rated P1 (Imminent) or P2 (Serious) on the department’s one priority scale (Corrective Action Register) because the condition could injure someone before it is fixed.
• Source capture: an exhaust extraction system that connects to the apparatus tailpipe and removes exhaust before it enters the bay.
• Station zoning: the marked division of a station into red (likely contaminated), yellow (transition, where contamination control happens) and green (clean) areas (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 12.5).
• Work-as-done: how a task is actually performed under real conditions, as distinct from how it is imagined (Hollnagel, 2014).
• Workplace inspection: the planned walk of a workplace to find hazards: monthly by officers, on the committee’s rotation by the JOHSC, and annually in full by the health and safety officer.

1. A station is a workplace first. Career and volunteer stations, shops and training grounds are inspected, maintained and answered for to the same standard.

2. Exhaust and contamination stay out of where members live. Diesel exhaust is a recognized human carcinogen (IARC, 2014), and installing a capture system is not the same as capturing exhaust (NIOSH, 2026b); the department verifies.

3. No energy, no exceptions. Nobody works on a machine or system that can move, shock or release pressure until it is locked out and proven dead.

4. Members have the right to know what is in their building. Radon, asbestos, lead and water results are told to the members who work there.

5. People are the solution we build around, not the problem to fix. The members who live and work in a station know its hazards best; this policy is built to hear them.

6. Procedures describe work as done, written with the people who do it. Every facilities procedure starts from a learning-team description of how the work is really done (Conklin, 2012).

7. Learning comes before blame, and learning information is never used for discipline. A member who left the exhaust hose off or carried gear into the kitchen is a source of information about why the building made that the easy path (Dekker, 2016).

8. Psychological safety is a condition of safety, so speaking up is expected and protected. A reported hazard gets an interim control, a place in the register and an answer to the person who reported it.

5.1 Inspection. 5.1.1 Every workplace shall be inspected monthly by its station officer with a member, on Form - Workplace Inspection Checklist (Station), following SWP - Workplace Inspection. 5.1.2 The JOHSC shall inspect on the rotation its terms of reference set, reaching every workplace at least once a year. 5.1.3 The health and safety officer, with facilities, shall inspect every workplace in full once a year on Form - Station Safety Inspection Checklist (Full). 5.1.4 A renovated or new building shall be inspected in full, with a committee worker member present, before members occupy it. 5.1.5 Every finding shall enter the Corrective Action Register within five working days. Accountable: the program manager; station officers; the health and safety officer.

5.2 Diesel exhaust. 5.2.1 Every apparatus bay position shall have source capture with a nozzle that fits each unit that uses it, or vehicle-mounted filtration where capture cannot be fitted. 5.2.2 The hose shall be on before an engine starts, and no apparatus shall idle in a bay. 5.2.3 While a system is out of service, bay doors shall be open before any start and checks shall be run outside. 5.2.4 Capture shall be verified at every position once a year, inspected visually every month and maintained under contract. 5.2.5 Living, sleeping and office areas shall be held at positive pressure to the bay, and carbon monoxide alarms shall be installed in sleeping areas next to bays. Accountable: facilities for the system; station officers for its use.

5.3 Zoning and contamination control in buildings. 5.3.1 Every station shall have a posted zoning plan with the red, yellow and green zones marked on the floor and doors. 5.3.2 PPE shall be stored in a ventilated space in the red or yellow zone, shielded from sunlight, and never in green zones, offices, dormitories, personal vehicles or homes. 5.3.3 Doors between zones shall be self-closing and never propped open. 5.3.4 Each station shall have a decon area with a sink separate from the kitchen and bathrooms, a gear extractor with posted instructions, trained users and a logbook, a laundry separate from living areas, sharps and biohazard disposal, and shower capacity for a crew to shower within the hour after a fire. 5.3.5 New stations shall be designed to the zoning; existing stations shall be brought to it by door, pressure and storage changes carried on the capital plan. Accountable: the program manager; facilities.

5.4 Shops and machine guarding. Machines shall be guarded and have start and stop controls within reach; grinders shall have tool rests and guards set to the regulation gap; chainsaws shall meet the saw standard; compressed air shall not be used on skin or clothing; split-rim and multi-piece wheels shall be inflated only in a cage; automotive pits shall be ventilated, covered and signed when not in use; vehicle lifts shall be inspected annually and rated against the apparatus axle weights; hot work outside a designated area shall be done under a permit; chemicals shall be labelled and stored under the hazard communication rules. Accountable: the shop supervisor; facilities where the shop is corporate.

5.5 Lockout. 5.5.1 The department shall keep a written lockout program and an equipment-specific procedure for every machine and system that can release energy, including apparatus air, hydraulic, power take-off and high-voltage systems, bay doors, compressors, fill systems, generators, transfer switches, exhaust fans, lifts, shop machines and building services. 5.5.2 Every person who works on such equipment shall apply a personal lock and tag, verify zero energy with a competent person, and remove only their own lock. 5.5.3 A lock may be removed by anyone else only under the written rule in SWP - Lockout and Shop Safety. 5.5.4 Where lockout is not practicable, work shall proceed only under a written alternative procedure approved by a competent person. 5.5.5 Contractors shall follow this program with their own locks. 5.5.6 The health and safety officer shall audit at least five procedures a year by watching the work. Accountable: the program manager; the shop supervisor.

5.6 Electrical safety. 5.6.1 No member shall do electrical work unless named as a qualified electrical person under an electrical safety program to the workplace electrical safety standard; otherwise electrical installation and repair shall be done by licensed electricians. 5.6.2 Energized work shall be done only under a permit with an arc flash risk assessment, and equipment shall carry arc flash labels where the assessment sets them. 5.6.3 Extension cords shall be temporary and in good repair, power bars shall not be daisy-chained, and electrical rooms and panels shall be kept clear. 5.6.4 Panels should be scanned by infrared thermography every three years. Accountable: facilities.

5.7 Falls, stairs, ladders and pole holes. 5.7.1 Floors, stairs, handrails and guardrails shall be maintained; wet bay floors controlled; and snow and ice cleared, with a winter walkway log at every station. 5.7.2 Every pole hole shall be enclosed or guarded with self-closing gates and landing cushioning, or the pole removed, and the decision recorded. 5.7.3 Portable and fixed station ladders shall be load-rated, inspected before use and annually, and used with three-point contact; fire service ground ladders shall not be used for building maintenance. 5.7.4 Fall protection shall be provided on hose towers, roofs, mezzanines and apparatus tops above the regulated trigger height (J16 Fall Protection and Rope Access). Accountable: station officers; facilities.

5.8 Fire safety and kitchens. 5.8.1 Each station shall have a fire safety plan under the fire code, an annual evacuation drill with a record, and alarms, sprinklers, extinguishers and emergency lighting inspected on schedule. 5.8.2 Cooking equipment shall be protected as the fire code and the occupancy classification require, with automatic stove-top suppression on residential ranges where no hood system is required. 5.8.3 “Stove off” shall be the first action on every turnout; a range interlock to the alerting system should be installed when kitchens are renovated. 5.8.4 Kitchen doors that form a fire separation shall be self-closing and latching. Accountable: station officers; facilities.

5.9 Sleep, alerting and noise. Dormitories shall be in the green zone with no direct opening to the bay, controlled light and noise, carbon monoxide alarms, and an alerting system that ramps its tones and lights and alerts only the units needed; hours and rest follow Policy - Fatigue and Hours of Work. Accountable: the program manager.

5.10 Fitness rooms. Fitness equipment shall be installed to the manufacturer’s clearances, inspected monthly, tagged out when defective, and located near a defibrillator. Accountable: station officers.

5.11 Environmental hazards. 5.11.1 Facilities shall keep an environmental register for every building: radon results, asbestos survey and management plan, lead paint assessment, legionella controls, carbon monoxide alarm tests and indoor air quality complaints and responses. 5.11.2 Every station shall have a long-term radon test; results above the national guideline shall be mitigated and retested, and stations shall be retested every five years and after renovation. 5.11.3 Every station built before 1990 shall have an asbestos survey and management plan, with materials labelled, disclosed to contractors and abated only by licensed contractors. 5.11.4 Hot water shall be stored at 60 °C or above and low-use fixtures flushed on a log. 5.11.5 The register shall be available at the station, and members shall be told the results for the building they work in. Accountable: facilities.

5.12 Breathing air compressors and pressure equipment. Cylinders shall be filled only inside a fragmentation enclosure; compressor intakes shall be located away from exhaust and fuel vapour; oil-lubricated compressors shall have continuous carbon monoxide monitoring; breathing air shall be tested as the respiratory protection program requires; air receivers and pressure vessels shall be registered and inspected as the applicable pressure equipment law requires (J20 Stations, Premises and Building Codes). Accountable: the program manager with the respiratory protection program administrator.

5.13 Generators and fuel. Standby generator exhaust shall discharge away from air intakes and bay doors; generators shall be tested monthly under load and load-bank tested annually; transfer switches shall be locked out under 5.5 for any work; fuel tanks shall meet the applicable storage rules (J21 WHMIS, Hazardous Materials and Asbestos), with grounded dispensing and spill kits; portable generators shall never run indoors. Accountable: facilities.

5.14 Emergency plans, working alone and security. 5.14.1 Every station shall have a posted emergency plan covering fire, medical emergencies in quarters, hazardous releases in the bay, utility and alerting failure, severe weather, intruders and threats, exercised with the annual evacuation drill. 5.14.2 A member on duty alone shall check in at an interval the plan sets, with a named response if a check-in is missed. 5.14.3 Doors to quarters shall latch and lock, visitors shall sign in and be escorted beyond public areas, and each station’s public areas shall have a violence risk assessment. Accountable: station officers.

5.15 Maintenance, turnaround and change. 5.15.1 The department and the municipality’s facilities function shall sign a service level agreement that commits to an interim control the same day and a repair within seven days for P1 items, sets turnaround times for P2, P3 (Moderate) and P4 (Improvement) items no longer than the closure times of the priority scale, assigns custody of the environmental register and the exhaust contract, and requires turnaround data each quarter. 5.15.2 A safety upgrade that exceeds maintenance budgets and cannot be finished inside its closure clock shall keep its priority in the register, flagged Capital, with a dated plan approved by the fire chief and reviewed quarterly by the JOHSC, and shall be carried on the capital plan; the interim control shall be re-verified monthly until the fix is in (Corrective Action Register section 4). 5.15.3 Renovations and new stations shall go through management of change, with the JOHSC consulted on the design and an inspection before occupancy. 5.15.4 Contractors shall work under Policy - Contractors and Mutual Aid. Accountable: the fire chief for the agreement; the program manager.

5.16 Hazard reporting, speaking up and reprisal. 5.16.1 Any member may report a hazard at any time by any route. 5.16.2 The officer shall put an interim control on a P1 hazard the same day. 5.16.3 The member shall hear back within five working days what was done or decided. 5.16.4 Any member may stop the use of a building system or refuse a shop task they believe is unsafe, and shall be thanked for it. 5.16.5 No member shall suffer reprisal for a report, a stop or a concern raised in good faith, and learning information shall never be used for discipline. Accountable: the fire chief.

5.17 Program, consultation and review. The department shall maintain Facilities and Station Safety Program and Workplace Inspections Program as the written programs this policy requires; charter the Facilities and Stations Program Improvement Team with facilities staff on it; consult the JOHSC before zoning retrofits, exhaust system changes, renovations and new station designs; produce a quarterly update and an annual appraisal; audit the program annually with Checklist - Facilities and Station Safety; and have it independently reviewed every three years. Accountable: the fire chief.

Only the differences from 01 Roles and Responsibilities are stated here.

6.1 Fire chief: signs the facilities service level agreement; escalates unfunded safety upgrades to the chief administrative officer and council in writing.

6.2 Program manager (line officer leading the Facilities and Stations team): accountable for the program’s outcome and indicators; owns every open facilities corrective action until verified closed.

6.3 Health and safety officer: runs the annual full inspection of every workplace and the lockout audit; samples monthly checklists and exhaust logs quarterly; investigates station and shop events.

6.4 Facilities function: maintains buildings and systems under the agreement; holds the exhaust contract and the environmental register; engages licensed contractors; reports turnaround data.

6.5 Station officers: inspect monthly; run the daily walk, the winter log and the annual drill; put interim controls on hazards; make sure reporters hear back.

6.6 Shop supervisor and technicians: keep guarding, lifts, the lock register and the monthly shop checklist; never start work without lockout.

6.7 Members: use the exhaust system and the zones as trained; report hazards; stop and speak up.

6.8 {{JOHSC}}: inspects on its rotation; designates a standing consultant to the team; is consulted on retrofits and designs; receives the environmental results and the inspection summaries.

• Facilities and Station Safety Program (FSSMS-PRG-10) and Workplace Inspections Program (FSSMS-PRG-23), with their toolkits.
• SWP - Diesel Exhaust and Station Zoning; SWP - Lockout and Shop Safety; SWP - Workplace Inspection.
• Shared: SWP - Post-Call Station Decontamination; SWP - Breathing Air Fill Station and Cylinder Handling; SWP - Fall Protection on Apparatus and at Heights; Decontamination and Contamination Control Program.
• Forms: Form - Workplace Inspection Checklist (Station); Form - Station Safety Inspection Checklist (Full); Form - Hazard Report; Form - Contractor Orientation Checklist.

8.1 The records this policy creates are the inspection forms and reports, the exhaust log and verification reports, the zoning plans, the lockout procedures, lock register and audit, the shop checklists, lift and pressure vessel certificates, the environmental register, fire safety plans and drill records, emergency plans, hazard reports with reply dates, and the service level agreement with its turnaround data. They are kept in {{Records system}}; environmental and building records for the life of the building, the rest at least five years (05 Document Control and Records).

8.2 Environmental results are not confidential to management: they are disclosed to the members of the building, the JOHSC and contractors who work there.

8.3 Every record is written on the assumption that it may be disclosed under freedom-of-information legislation, and identifies people by role. Hazard reports name the condition, not a person; learning-team notes are de-identified and never placed in a personnel file.

9.1 To the fire chief: the quarterly indicator update; any Tier 2 or Tier 3 station or shop event within 24 hours; the annual appraisal; unfunded safety upgrades.

9.2 To {{JOHSC}}: the monthly inspection summary; the corrective action register; environmental results; exhaust verification results; lockout audit findings.

9.3 To council or the governing board: facilities indicators and the capital list of safety upgrades in the annual health and safety report (03 Accountability and Reporting).

9.4 To the regulator and the compensation board: as the applicable law requires for injuries and dangerous occurrences, including structural failures (J08 Incident Reporting and Investigation).

11.1 The applicable occupational health and safety statute and regulations: the general duty (J02 Duties of Employers, Supervisors, Workers and Contractors); written procedures (J06 Written Procedures and Committee Consultation) and the hazard identification and inspection system (J04 Hazard Assessment and Workplace Inspections); lockout, machine safety and electrical rules (J19 Lockout, Machine Guarding and Electrical Safety); premises (J20 Stations, Premises and Building Codes); ventilation and exposure limits (J22 Exposure Limits, Heat and Cold Stress); equipment and ladder inspection (J15 Equipment Inspection, Ladders and Aerial Devices) and fall protection (J16 Fall Protection and Rope Access); workplace violence risk assessment (J26 Workplace Violence); and record retention (J09 Records Retention).

11.2 The building and fire codes in force, fire safety plan rules and pressure equipment registration (J20 Stations, Premises and Building Codes); electrical installation and licensing (J19 Lockout, Machine Guarding and Electrical Safety); and the petroleum storage and asbestos rules (J21 WHMIS, Hazardous Materials and Asbestos).

11.3 NFPA 1550 (2024): facility safety and the red, yellow and green zones (ch. 12, cl. 12.5) and the health and safety officer’s facility inspection duty (ch. 4); NFPA 1585 (2025): contamination control in facilities; NFPA 1580 (2025): infection control facilities.

11.4 Diesel exhaust as a carcinogen (IARC, 2014) and the evidence that installed capture systems fail without verification (NIOSH, 2026b).

11.5 Lockout (CSA Z460:20); machine safeguarding (CSA Z432:23); workplace electrical safety (CSA Z462:24); breathing air (CSA Z180.1:19).

11.6 The national radon guideline of 200 Bq/m³ (Health Canada, 2007); legionella risk management for building water systems (ANSI/ASHRAE 188-2021).

11.7 Accreditation: facilities adequate, clean and maintained on a plan; code compliance and safety upgrades; the maintenance facility; hazard reporting, risk reduction, safety training and contamination control (CPSE, 2019, criteria 6B.1, 6B.2, 6B.3, 6D.2, 11A.2, 11A.3, 11A.5, 11A.9).

12.1 This policy is reviewed 12 months after adoption and every three years after that.

12.2 It is reviewed sooner after a station or shop death, critical injury or Tier 2 event; a carbon monoxide event in quarters; a failed exhaust verification at more than one station; a change in the applicable regulation or code; a written request of {{JOHSC}}; or when the annual audit or appraisal recommends it.

12.3 Every revision is consulted with {{JOHSC}}, {{Union}}, {{Volunteer Association}} and the facilities function before approval, and the consultation record is filed with the policy.

Consult early, before the policy is in final form, and put the outcome in writing.

Where the parties disagree, record the disagreement, adopt what can be adopted, and review at 12 months.

Disclaimer. This model policy is general information for the use of {{Department}} in building its own policy. It is not legal advice. The applicable statute, regulation, code and collective agreement govern on any conflict. Confirm every cited clause and section with counsel before adoption.

End of model policy.

This chapter relies on the following legal requirements, which differ by province and territory. Check your jurisdiction’s section on each topic page before adopting it.