The City of Chicago Office of Inspector General has completed a follow-up to its October 2013 audit of the Chicago Fire Department’s (CFD) fire and medical incident response times.
The purpose of the 2013 audit was to determine if CFD fire and medical response times met National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Standard 1710, which CFD historically claimed it met or exceeded. Our audit found that CFD did not meet the NFPA standard and that CFD’s internal reports lacked the elements necessary to accurately assess whether the Department was in fact meeting or exceeding the national standards as it claimed publicly.
Based on CFD’s follow-up responses, OIG concludes that CFD does not intend to implement any corrective actions related to the original findings, which were based on standards of NFPA and the Commission on Fire Accreditation International. OIG maintains, as stated in the October 2013 audit report, that documenting performance goals and accurately assessing performance outcomes are basic and critical management functions.
