Arizona · NERIS
NERIS reporting in Arizona
Career departments are the largest single type in Arizona's directory, a shape only a couple of other states share. That still leaves more than half of Arizona's departments running on some volunteer staffing, and NERIS asks the same questions of both.
Fire departments in Arizona
- Departments in the directory
- 206
- Volunteer departments
- 24%
- Volunteer or combination
- 58%
- Stations
- 683
44 of 184 departments that report a department type
107 of 184 departments that report a department type
reported by 175 departments
Across the 180 Arizona departments that report staffing, the directory holds 1,029 volunteer firefighters and 7,856 career firefighters; 12% of those counted are volunteers.
Source: the NERIS public department directory, as mirrored in our departments table on July 28, 2026. Percentages are stated against the number of departments that actually reported the field, which is always shown next to them. Departments that reported nothing are not counted as zero and no figure here is estimated.
Career departments lead here — almost nowhere else in this snapshot
Of the 184 Arizona departments that report a department type, 77 are career, 63 are combination, and 44 are volunteer. Career is the largest single group, and that alone puts Arizona in unusual company: across the 53 states and territories in this snapshot, only Arizona, California, and Florida have career departments outnumbering both combination and volunteer departments individually. Everywhere else, volunteer or combination departments carry the largest count.
Add the other two categories back together and the lead disappears. Combination and volunteer departments combined are 107 of the 184 typed departments: 58%, a majority. Career departments win the individual comparison; they do not win the group comparison. A chief running one of those 107 departments files into the same NERIS module list as a career department across town, without necessarily having the same admin structure sitting behind them.
The headcount tells a different story than the department count
Switch from counting departments to counting people and the split gets more lopsided, not less. Of the 180 Arizona departments that report staffing, the directory holds 7,856 career firefighters against 1,029 volunteers, roughly seven and a half career firefighters for every volunteer counted. A state where career departments are merely the largest type, not a majority, turns out to be dominated by career staff once headcount replaces department count as the measure.
What the directory is thin on, and what it isn’t
Reporting is solid on the operational fields: 184 of 206 departments answered the type question, 175 reported a station count between them totaling 683 stations, and 180 reported staffing. Population served is the exception. Only 28 of Arizona’s 206 departments report it, summing to 784,461 people, too small a share of the state to call it coverage. This page doesn’t use that number as one.
None of that changes who sits with the report once the call is over. It changes how much backup they have doing it: more, on average, in one of the state’s 77 career departments; less in one of the 107 running combination or all-volunteer staffing, where the same short list of modules still has to get filled in by whoever answered the call.
Worth knowing about Arizona
Arizona has 206 fire departments in the NERIS public directory. Of the 184 that report a department type, 77 are career, 63 are combination, and 44 are volunteer — career is the largest single group, but well short of a majority.
Source: snapshot: AZ.department_count, AZ.by_department_type, AZ.departments_with_type_data
Of the 53 states and territories in this snapshot, only Arizona, California, and Florida have career departments outnumbering both combination and volunteer departments individually — everywhere else, volunteer or combination departments are the largest group.
Source: snapshot: AZ.by_department_type compared against by_department_type for CA, FL, and every other state/territory entry in state-department-snapshot.json
Combination and volunteer departments together are 107 of the 184 typed Arizona departments — 58%, a majority, even though career is the single largest category on its own.
Source: snapshot: AZ.by_department_type, AZ.departments_with_type_data
Across the 180 Arizona departments that report staffing, the directory counts 7,856 career firefighters against 1,029 volunteers — about seven and a half career firefighters for every volunteer counted.
Source: snapshot: AZ.firefighters_career_sum, AZ.firefighters_volunteer_sum, AZ.departments_with_staffing_data
Only 28 of Arizona's 206 departments report the population they protect, summing to 784,461 — too thin a sample to use as a statewide coverage figure, so this page does not state a population-covered percentage.
Source: snapshot: AZ.population_protected_sum, AZ.departments_with_population_data, AZ.department_count
What changed
NERIS replaced NFIRS as the federal fire incident reporting standard onFebruary 1, 2026. It is a different shape of report, not a renamed one: modules instead of flat forms, a three-level text hierarchy instead of numeric incident codes, and an API instead of a file you upload.
What actually changed, in detail · NERIS onboarding (FSRI) · Department sign-up
About grant applications
We're not going to guess at what the Assistance to Firefighters Grant program asks of an applicant beyond what's already in the notice of funding opportunity — that document is the honest source here, not a vendor's state page, and nothing in this project confirms that NERIS reporting factors into AFG eligibility or scoring one way or the other. What we can say sidesteps the grant rules entirely: those applications ask about call volume and department operations, and a department answering from reports it already filed is working from better material than one piecing a year together from memory afterward.
We are a vendor, not a grant advisor. Do not take our word for what any grant program requires. Read the current notice of funding opportunity or ask your state's grant coordinator.
Try it on a real Arizona call
Record one incident, read the report it produces, and decide from there. No account, no card, no call with anyone.
FireMic is a private company. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or recommended by any Arizona state agency, USFA, FSRI, or FEMA. State fire officials do not endorse vendors, and nothing on this page should be read as suggesting otherwise.
Department figures: FireMic Supabase departments table (mirror of the NERIS public department directory, ArcGIS layer 0). Snapshot taken July 28, 2026.