Evaluation of enhanced collaboration between fire and rescue services and security officers

The hypothesis of this study is that collaboration between fire and rescue services and new actors, with basic rescue skills, might be a cost effective way to improve emergency response. Interview studies of collaborations between fire and rescue services and security officers in three Swedish municipalities are presented. Seven semi-structured interviews are conducted with representatives from the security officer companies, the fire and rescue services and security managers at the municipalities. The method used to evaluate the collaborations quantitatively is Cost-benefit analysis. The collaborations have positive economic effects for society that most likely outweighs the costs. There also exist several external effects that are not possible to value monetarily, but that represent positive values for society. The results and their generalizability are discussed, as well as the possibility for these new collaborations to improve crisis management.