Providence not only has the largest number of firefighters in the state but also the highest-paid individual firefighter. The Providence Journal / Mary Murphy

Nearly every other state in the nation pays less per resident to run its fire departments — personnel, buildings, equipment and other costs — than Rhode Island shelled out last year in fire department payrolls alone.

The Rhode Island fire department payrolls would rank the state third nationally when compared with the total costs in other states, a Providence Journal analysis of municipal employee payroll information shows.

The Ocean State’s city and town fire departments — but not independent fire districts — paid $158 million to their employees last year, according to information supplied by cities and towns in response to a public records request from The Journal. That does not include millions more spent on fringe benefits. The $158-million payroll works out to $150.55 for every man, woman and child in Rhode Island, as counted by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2000.

Nationally, Americans paid $104 per person for fire protection, according to an analysis issued last week by the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council. The Ocean State topped RIPEC’s list at $231 a person, but those figures represent all the costs associated with fire protection, including buying and maintaining equipment and buildings. The $150.55 a person that Rhode Islanders paid last year covers only the payroll for fire service personnel.

The top five on RIPEC’s list were Rhode Island, at $231 a person; Alaska, at $156; Nevada, $154; Massachusetts, $142, and Washington, $140. RIPEC’s figures were for the budget year that ended June 30, 2005, the year before the one examined by The Journal. Accounting for inflation, Rhode Island’s personnel costs alone would fall third, between the total cost for Massachusetts and Nevada.

And Rhode Island’s payroll costs are probably higher than reflected in The Journal’s information. The paper did not receive earnings information from the 15 of the state’s 39 cities and towns. Fire protection is provided by independent fire districts in 14 of those, and the 15th provided salary levels, but not actual earnings information. In calculating the $150.55 figure, the newspaper assumed the 15 missing towns spent nothing on fire service personnel costs. Though the districts tend to be largely volunteer, some have a handful of paid employees, whose earnings would push the $150.55 higher.

The 24 cities and towns that supplied earnings information averaged $6.6 million in fire department payroll. But that average represents a wide range, from towns paying less than $100,000 to a handful of employees in otherwise volunteer departments, to the city of Providence, whose bill topped $48 million.

Providence’s costs included nearly $10 million in lump-sum retroactive pay raises that an arbitrator ordered last year in a long-running contract dispute.

Factoring out Providence’s retroactive pay, the state average per department drops to $6.2 million. And the per-resident cost for the state drops to $141.09, which would still rank sixth on RIPEC’s national list — again, without counting Rhode Island’s non-payroll costs.

The fire service does not represent the lion’s share of a city’s or town’s payroll. That distinction goes to the school department, which usually gets more than half of a municipal payroll. The fire service payroll generally accounts for less than 20 percent of a municipal payroll in communities that have a paid municipal department.

In calculating “fire department” payroll, The Journal included employees who perform fire service functions, even if they were not assigned to the fire department in a given community. As an example, fire dispatchers who work for a “communications department” are included in the figures.

The highest-paid municipal fire service employee was Providence Lt. Zachariah Kenyon, who grossed $175,225.78. That includes more than $82,000 in base pay, plus more than $90,000 in overtime, according to figures supplied by the city. But Kenyon’s pay in 2006 — along with other unionized firefighters in Providence — included the lump sum retroactive pay raise. Without the retroactive pay, Kenyon would have grossed $144,672.78, still highest in the state.

The Journal excluded from its calculations Providence Deputy Assistant Chief Michael J. Day, who collapsed and died in his office on June 13, 2006, after returning from a fire. Providence’s gross pay for Day in 2006 totaled $186,541.30, but much of that included death benefits.

The highest grossing fire service employee outside Providence was Johnston’s Deputy Chief Thomas Ucci Jr., who made $143,688.70.

In average gross pay to fire service personnel last year, Providence topped the list at $89,457. The city was followed by Cranston, at $77,276; Johnston, $74,499; Narragansett, $73,917; Warwick, $73,509; East Providence, $73,239, and West Warwick, $72,626.

If the retroactive pay is factored out, Providence drops to seventh in the state, just behind West Warwick, at $71,161.

Providence also topped the list in terms of cost per resident, at $279. It was followed by Newport, $264; Johnston, $251; North Providence, $215, and Cranston, $209.

Factoring out the retroactive pay, Providence drops to third on the list, at $222.

Providence ranked fifth in terms of the number of residents served for each paid fire service employee for departments with payrolls higher than $1 million.

Newport had the highest proportion of paid fire service employees, with one for every 255 residents. It was followed by North Providence, with 270 resident per paid employee; Johnston, 297; Woonsocket, 302, and Providence, 320.

After examining state employee costs this summer, The Journal requested municipal employee pay information from the 39 cities and towns and 36 school districts in Rhode Island. The state’s Access to Public Records Act requires government agencies to release certain information about their employees, including names, hometowns, base pay, overtime pay and other pay.

The newspaper plans future stories on municipal employee costs. Top Ten Average Payrolls

Here are the 10 communities with the highest average gross pay last year for municipal fire service employees. Twenty-four communities reported fire service pay in response to a request from The Providence Journal. The average pay for Providence does not include a one-time, lump-sum, retroactive pay increase paid last year. With the retroactive pay, Providence’s average was $89,457.26.