Maine · NERIS
Filing NERIS reports in Maine
Maine runs 406 fire departments, and more of them blend paid and volunteer staffing than in neighboring Vermont. NERIS asks the same set of modules of a combination company as it does a single-station volunteer squad.
Fire departments in Maine
- Departments in the directory
- 406
- Volunteer departments
- 69%
- Volunteer or combination
- 96%
- Stations
- 585
236 of 343 departments that report a department type
330 of 343 departments that report a department type
reported by 348 departments
Across the 319 Maine departments that report staffing, the directory holds 4,832 volunteer firefighters and 2,625 career firefighters; 65% 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.
Combination is common here in a way it isn’t next door
Maine has 406 fire departments in the NERIS public directory. Of the 343 that report a department type, 236 are volunteer, 94 are combination, and 13 are career. Add volunteer and combination together and you get 96% of the typed group, almost exactly Vermont’s 95% in the same snapshot. The two states get there differently. Vermont’s share is built almost entirely from outright volunteer departments, with combination sitting at just 8%. In Maine, combination alone accounts for 27% of typed departments, more than three times Vermont’s rate — a lot of Maine towns are running a small paid crew or duty officer layered onto a volunteer company, not a single unpaid roster covering everything itself.
A paid layer doesn’t close the reporting gap, it relocates it
Career departments barely register on their own: 13 of 343 typed, 4%. The staffing numbers track that closely: across the 319 departments that report a headcount, the directory holds 4,832 volunteer firefighters against 2,625 career, 65% volunteer, not far off the 69% volunteer share by department count. What the combination share changes is who ends up filing the report. In a department running a duty officer or a small paid shift, that person is more often the one left holding the NERIS form afterward, on top of whatever else the shift already covers, instead of one volunteer secretary handling it for the whole roster on their own time.
More buildings, not more staff dedicated to paperwork
585 stations are reported across 348 of Maine’s 406 departments, about 1.7 for every department that answered, which is a little more coverage per department than Vermont’s 1.4. Extra stations and a paid layer inside otherwise-volunteer departments still don’t add up to a records office. It’s one person, or a short list of people, filling out a longer, module-based form than NFIRS used to ask for. Recording the call and reading back what it turns into is built for that specific gap, not for a department that already has someone whose whole job is this.
Worth knowing about Maine
Maine has 406 fire departments in the NERIS public directory, and 343 of them report a department type: 236 volunteer, 94 combination, and 13 career.
Source: snapshot: ME.department_count, ME.by_department_type, ME.departments_with_type_data
94 of Maine's 343 typed departments — 27% — are combination, more than three times Vermont's 8% (17 of 202) in the same snapshot, even though the two states land within a point of each other on total volunteer-or-combination share (96% in Maine, 95% in Vermont).
Source: snapshot: ME.by_department_type/ME.departments_with_type_data compared against VT.by_department_type/VT.departments_with_type_data
Only 13 of Maine's 343 typed departments — 4% — are career, the smallest of the three categories by a wide margin.
Source: snapshot: ME.by_department_type, ME.departments_with_type_data
Across the 319 Maine departments that report staffing, the directory counts 4,832 volunteer firefighters against 2,625 career — 65% volunteer, close to the 69% volunteer share by department count.
Source: snapshot: ME.firefighters_volunteer_sum, ME.firefighters_career_sum, ME.departments_with_staffing_data compared against ME.by_department_type.VOLUNTEER and ME.departments_with_type_data
585 stations are reported across 348 of Maine's 406 departments — about 1.7 stations for every department that answered, versus Vermont's 1.4 in the same file.
Source: snapshot: ME.station_count_sum, ME.departments_with_station_data compared against VT.station_count_sum, VT.departments_with_station_data
Only 126 of Maine's 406 departments — 31% — report a population-protected figure, summing to 552,495; too partial a slice of the state to read as a coverage total.
Source: snapshot: ME.population_protected_sum, ME.departments_with_population_data, ME.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
Maine departments that apply for an Assistance to Firefighters Grant answer questions there about call volume and how the department is staffed, and a combination company answers that differently than a fully volunteer one does. We have not found anything tying AFG scoring to NERIS filing status, and we are not the source to check that against anyway — the grant program's own notice of funding opportunity is. What we will say, narrowly: those questions are quicker to answer from a season of reports already on file than from calls that still have to be pieced back together 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 Maine 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 Maine 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.