Budgets, equipment get approval from fire district

Tuesday, October 3, 2006

Officials with the VanBibber Lake Volunteer Fire Dept. may not have gotten their wish list granted by the Walnut Creek Fire Protection District board Thursday night, but it wasn't a total loss.

At their meeting to approve 2007 budgets for VanBibber and Bainbridge fire departments, board members agreed to raise VanBibber's funding from the Walnut Creek budget next year from $20,000 to $22,000.

They also decided to go ahead with the purchase of a portable pump which Fire Chief Adam Roach said is critical for flood control.

Meanwhile, Roach's request for more firefighters and equipment may have to wait.

Roach informed the board that right now he has 13 firefighters on the roster, but by the end of this year, he hopes to be at 20 firefighters. He said these firefighters would need equipment, such as turnout gear and pagers.

The price of pagers fluctuates between $400-$500, he said, and he wants these pagers for additional firefighters and to relieve some stress on current radios. By getting six pagers now and six later, "we can keep radios on station or just the officers have radios."

Roach presented a budget of $44,315.75, but reduced the amount to $30,340 after removing equipment purchases.

Walnut Creek treasurer Kathy Deer recommended that the board keep the contract and dollar amount the same.

Roach asked the board if it would take a look at the budget total if it removed the utilities and whatever else the board thought should be removed to see how much VanBibber should receive.

The board reworked VanBibber's budget to where the board would be taking care of some of the department's expenses.

"I'll be honest with you, this is my wish list," Roach said about the budget.

Meanwhile, officials with the Bainbridge Fire Department said they needed no adjustments for their contract.

"We're content," Fire Chief Mike Smith said.

Bainbridge's contract amount will stay the same at $33,000.

Prior to approving the contracts, board President Jim Hilburn said he wanted to define a couple of items.

The fire departments are required to provide run report numbers, dates of incidents, type of incidents, and incidents location to the board.

The board will be adding these requirements to next year's contract, along with other items like rosters, and financial reports. The board also added that run information would be needed from both departments by the April meeting of the following year.

VanBibber board member Larry Miller brought up a issue with one item on VanBibber's contract. The way this item was worded, it sounded like VanBibber could not purchase or replace any equipment without the board's approval.

Hilburn said that the only way to fix this issue was to either remove the word equipment from the contract or define capital expenditures.

Board member Robert Hensley suggested rewriting the item to read no new expenditures over a certain dollar amount, excluding repairs and replacements on existing equipment.

Hilburn said it was written to prevent the departments from spending money on a new truck that would added to the insurance. He also reminded both departments that if something breaks down, both departments could call a special meeting.

Respond to this story

Posting a comment requires free registration: