2026 may be the year that Eugene Springfield firefighters get a long awaited change to how their department is funded and structured, and the head of their union is in support.
The Eugene City Council discussed and endorsed a plan earlier in December that would create an intergovernmental entity between Eugene and Springfield to administrate the Eugene Springfield Fire Department.
The plan would end a roughly 20-year-old agreement between the cities that began the process of merging their then-separate fire departments. It would instead place operations under a shared entity governed by a board.
The plan is similar, though not identical to one mentioned in a 2024 study by AP Triton that Eugene commissioned.
Of the five options in the report, IAFF local 8511 expressed a preference for the creation of a fire district.
But the chapter president said Eugene’s plan is a step in the right direction.
"There’s those continued pieces of making sure that the communities that they were elected to serve are served in the appropriate manner, and that’s a legitimate conversation to have,” said Local 8511 Lane Professional Firefighters President Brett Deedon. “But I do hope we all move in the same direction going forward, and that’s with this model."
Any change to the status quo would require both cities’ approval.
“There’s still some pieces to be negotiated by the two cities: the representation piece, the financial piece, some bigger pieces there,” said Deedon. “But we have direction from both cities’ councilors and senior leadership on both sides.”
Deedon expects more movement on the plan in January. Progress would start a timeline that is expected to take 2-5 years, though he thinks much of the work could be completed on the early side of that estimate.
