County compromises on South Warren Fire & Rescue staffing

The Warren County Board of Supervisors greeted the New Year on January 3^rd by reappointing Linda Glavis as Chair, and appointing Tony Carter to take over from Archie Fox as Vice Chairman.  With its officers installed the Board quickly got past housekeeping formalities, approving rules and its meeting schedule for the coming year.  Also acknowledged during the report of Schools Superintendent Greg Drescher was the passing of long-time County Revenue Office employee and School Board member Roy Boyles who succumbed to a long battle with cancer over the holidays.

The ‘Headless Horsemen” – a Board in search of a Chair and Vice Chair for the New Year. Linda Glavis, center, was reappointed Chair and Tony Carter, far right, succeeded Archie Fox, to Carter’s right as Vice Chair of the Warren Board of Supervisors. Photos/Roger Bianchini

Then it was back down to the nuts and bolts of County business – the most serious being dealing with a staffing crisis in the face of declining membership and volunteer staffing at South Warren Fire & Rescue Company 3.  As reported previously, the issue was reviewed in detail at a December 13^th work session where a middle ground approach appeared to be a majority consensus.

And on January 3, that middle ground – funding two paid staff for the final six months of the Fiscal Year at a cost of $65,000 – was authorized.  The decision fell between County Fire Chief Richard Mabie and Company 3 Chief Alan Brockway’s desired full-staffing option of four paid positions at twice that cost, and a no-cost, no-new staff option that would force South Warren to continue to rely on other department’s personnel to help fill coverage gaps.  However, the County will pursue emergency service grants to allow the full staffing option to be implemented in the next Fiscal Year beginning in July.

Asked if he could live with the compromise following adjournment of the work session, Brockway said he would have to and then repeated what he told the supervisors earlier, “I just hope nothing happens on those off days – what price do you put on a human life?”

Those “days off” will be from 9 to 11 per month, Brockway estimated of the two position solution.  And while that is certainly an improvement over the total lack of daytime staffing Company 3 now has, for those who have made a career in emergency services, that week-and-a-half per month of reduced or even no localized responders seems a dangerous gamble to live – or die with.

As Brockway said, “What price do you put on a human life?”

The price of the two, paid-staff solution for an entire year would be a third of a penny hike to the County Real Estate Tax rate.  As mentioned during the December work session discussion, each penny of County Real Estate Tax generates about $405,000.  A third of a penny generates about $133,000 of revenue.  The four, new paid-position option was estimated at an annual cost of $240,000 last month.  So, a two-thirds-of-a-penny hike to the Real Estate Tax rate would cover implementation of the preferred departmental option of four new paid positions for South Warren Company 3.

“It would take six-tenths of a penny to cover costs,” Dan Murray said of the full-staffing option, adding pointedly, “Nobody wants to raise taxes – until their wife or kid is lying on the floor.”

“I think everyone agrees 24×7 coverage is our ultimate goal – the question is how do we get there?” County Administrator Doug Stanley told his board.

South River District’s Linda Glavis throws her hands up as how to best achieve a balance of service and costs in her district’s emergency services is discussed.  Photo/Roger Bianchini

Tony Carter agreed, stating, “I’d like to see 24×7 but we can run the course with the grant.”  The Grant is the potential of higher-level public funding stream for the additional two positions needed to achieve the full staffing option.  Staff indicated March 1 is the deadline to apply for the emergency services grant funding, with a decision on recipients expected by June, hopefully prior to the start of the next Fiscal Year.

So with the hope of that higher governmental funding stream coming available six months down the road for Fiscal Year 2018 to allow the full, four paid staff option to be implemented, the Board decided to roll the dice on a partial fix for the remainder of this Fiscal Year.

With a vote authorizing the $65,000 funding out of the current budget likely at the second January meeting, Stanley told Emergency Services officials that implementation of those two new paid staffers would likely be achieved at some point in February.

Revisiting the rationale

County Emergency Services Chief Richard Mabie, standing, and Tony Carter, seated foreground, listen as South Warren Company 3 President Sonny Cheeks describes the staffing plight of his department. Photo/Roger Bianchini

To explain the reasoning for the staffing request for South Warren Company 3, we revisit information provided at the December 13 work session by County Fire Marshal Gerry Maiatico and Chief Richard Mabie.

Maiatico explained in prefacing departmental recommendations that South Warren Company 3 covers an area comprised of about 10 percent of the County’s population, but on about 30 percent of its land.  It is land that is rural, mountainous and often remote, even in the Browntown and Bentonville population centers.  It is also a department sharing a county and nationwide crisis in volunteerism; coupled with an aging segment of the population that even if they want to help, may not physically be able to.

Consequently, South Warren Company 3’s core membership has fallen from the seven reported in the 2009 Springsted “Study of the County’s Volunteer and Professional Fire & Rescue Department”, to just three members today.  In 2009, Springsted wrote of the then seven core firefighters of Company 3, “Members are extremely dedicated but are basically burned out from carrying the full load of daily operations and administrative functions.”

Today, with South Warren’s base personnel less than half that of 2009, the strain extends beyond Company 3 into other departments that help cover over 20 percent of South Warren calls – calls that numbered 378 in the last Fiscal Year.