Leon County Fire Coverage & Insurance Risk

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Tap to compare today's 16-station system against the 6 county stations left after 2028

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Tap to return to the post-2028 view — only the 6 county stations remain

16,867

Total homes beyond 5 road miles of a county station

~8,800 more are still protected by TFD, until 2028

8,800

All homes protected by a TFD run-area today — coverage that ends Oct 1, 2028

~8,100 are beyond every station's reach even today, city or county

3,984

Mobile homes beyond 5 road miles of a county station

~1,600 are still protected by TFD, until 2028

~1,600

Mobile homes protected by a TFD today — coverage that ends Oct 1, 2028

~2,400 are beyond every station's reach even today, with all 16 stations

12,883

Single-family homes beyond 5 road miles of a county station

~7,200 are still protected by TFD, until 2028

~7,200

Single-family homes protected by a TFD today — coverage that ends Oct 1, 2028

~5,700 are beyond every station's reach even today, with all 16 stations

On July 14, 2026, Leon County voted unanimously to terminate the fire-services agreement for cause; the City has separately voted to end its role serving the unincorporated county.
The County's ~$110,000 consultant study is due back in September 2026, when a workshop will decide whether to fully fund a county fire department — this page tracks homes at risk of losing insurance either way.

12,883 single-family homes and 3,984 mobile homes sit beyond 5 road miles of a county station today — a distance fact, not yet an insurance conclusion.
Of those, an estimated 8,800 homes (7,200 single-family + 1,600 mobile homes) sit within 5 road miles of a Tallahassee Fire station today — protection they'll lose in 2028. The remaining ~8,100 are already outside every station's service area, so they're at risk no matter how this ends.
Two Leon Counties, one bill. The risk is regressive — hardest on Districts 1 and 2, where zones like Woodville and Fort Braden are majority mobile-home — but it still reaches thousands of single-family homes in District 3.
Phase 2 pairs the address-level lookup with the cost picture from the working model — three numbers to know:

1

The standalone cost of a County-run fire department. A standalone county department, sharing services with Leon County EMS (~114 employees), runs ~$25 million a year — 2.1× the ~$11.8M paid to the City today. The County has already agreed to arbitration rates worth ~$13.8M/yr; even the City's full ask (~$15.4M/yr) is $10M+ less than going alone. Typical household assessment rises from $223 to ~$470–500. EMS stays separate — its own ~$33.4M countywide budget continues, with only a ~$1.3–1.9M/yr shared-overhead offset. Combined county emergency-services spending under standalone: roughly $58–59M, vs ~$45M today.

2

TFD personnel at risk. County funding supports ~70–100 City firefighter positions, closed through attrition and vacancy freezes as their union contract expires before separation. Whether they transfer to a county department — the transition's only viable labor pool — is the biggest open question.

3

Initial capital — just to get going. Startup runs ~$20 million all-in ($13M lean to $24M+ high; ~$1.7–1.9M/yr in debt service over 15 years). Day-one City assets are only ~$4.6M: Stations 10–14 and land are capped at $525,000, apparatus at depreciated value — but Station 15's apparatus is excluded (~$1–1.5M to replace) and a 2028–31 fleet catch-up adds ~$2.5–3.2M. If the County loses the termination-vs-expiration asset fight, the fallback is $30M+ in market acquisition or new construction.

The dates that matter: September 2026 — the readiness vote (ISO pre-assessment, condition surveys, apparatus orders against 2–4 year lead times). Mid-2027 — the go/no-go decision, the last date for a real build-out window. October 1, 2028 — continuous protection, with or without the City.

Figures from the Options Study executive summary (advance release, July 22, 2026) — independent analysis, not the County's consulting report. The full study, with sourcing, publishes as Phase 3.

Distance to a station.Six county stations cover most of unincorporated Leon County today. When the City's 16 stations stop covering the county on October 1, 2028, that protected radius shrinks to just those six.

Your ISO/PPC rating.Insurers price fire risk largely off distance: within ~5 road miles of a station is a "protected" class; beyond that, insurers increasingly rate it unprotected.

Your policy.Unprotected can mean higher premiums, fewer willing carriers, and for some homes non-renewal — pushing owners into costlier surplus-lines coverage.

The cliff, not the slope.Rates stay essentially flat from ISO Class 1 through 5 — a modest slip costs a homeowner almost nothing. The damage is the cliff: Class 8–10 "unprotected" runs $165–700+/yr per household ($4.5–15M/yr county-wide), landing on exactly the homes this map shades. A well-funded county department would start around Class 4–6 in hydranted areas — safely above it.

How we calculated this

Figures are deduplicated parcel counts from the Tallahassee-Leon County GIS layer, intersected with each county station's real 5-road-mile-equivalent reach (calibrated from measured road routing, not straight-line distance). The TFD split uses the city's own dispatch run-area boundaries, not schematic circles. A working analysis, not an official ISO/PPC rating of any address — see "About this page" below.

Protected todayWithin reach of a fire station — standard homeowners coverage is generally available.

At risk beyond 2028Outside every county station's reach — mobile homes here are essentially always Class 10 unprotected; single-family homes face a real, zone-specific risk of the same. A new station can't open before ~2030 — the only day-one fix is an automatic-aid agreement with the City, signed before separation.

Show current TFD coverage — today's one 16-station system, until Oct 2028

More at-risk homes Fewer at-risk homes County fire station — stays after 2028 TFD station — leaves county service in 2028 Volunteer station — crosshatched = limited-credit coverage Leon County line Tallahassee city limits — excluded from shading

Source: Tallahassee-Leon County GIS parcel data, July 2026

Every count is a deduplicated parcel count from the public Tallahassee-Leon County GIS (tlcgis.org): unincorporated parcels only, single-family and mobile-home use codes, re-verified against the live parcel database July 20, 2026. Station reach is a schematic 5-road-mile equivalent (5 mi ÷ 1.55 road-to-straight-line factor, calibrated from measured road routing). The TFD split uses the city's real dispatch run-area polygons (TLC_OverlayTFD_RunAreas, all 78 first-due beats of the 10 city stations, area-verified July 22, 2026). Shading is clipped to the real county line and city limits and to where homes of each type actually exist — large empty areas such as national forest aren't shaded. All seven volunteer station sites (11A, 11B, and county-owned substations FS29–FS33) extend geographic reach beyond the six county stations, but volunteer coverage earns limited insurer/ISO credit and its ISO recognition is unverified (pending public-records request) — so it is drawn crosshatched and excluded from every headline figure on this page. Volunteer station locations and ownership are from the CDA GIS public-safety locations layer (July 2026); Options Study canonical figure basis. Sources (all public, REST directory at intervector.leoncountyfl.gov): TLC_OverlayPropInfo_Enhanced, TLC_Overlay_Citylimits, FLEM_OverlayRegion2Boundaries, TLC_OverlayPublicSafety_Locations_D_WM. Not an official ISO rating of any address, and not a County or City publication.

Is your Leon County home at risk of insurance non-renewal after 2028?

What "at risk" means for insurance

About this page — method in brief