White River Township Fire Protection
District
Pre-Meeting
Report for September 6, 2005
Compiled August 30, 2005
- The Common Construction Wage Hearing for the
Station 52 room addition project was held on August 17th with no
problems or concerns.
- The Common Construction Wage Hearing for the new
fire station (Station 51) was held also on August 17th. Additionally, the hearing before the
Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF) was held on August 25th
and received a 4 to 1 vote IN FAVOR of the project. The project now goes to the State Tax
Commissioner, who has the final authority on the matter and typically
rules in favor of the board’s recommendation. This process could take up to 60 days
but is in most cases completed well before then. In the meantime, engineering of the
building plan continues and hopefully with a favorable reply from the tax
commissioner along with a speedy loan process, construction could begin as
early as December.
- Chief Brown and Chief Tibbetts attended the
Johnson County Commissioner’s meeting on August 29th to follow
up on the proposed Fire Protection Ordinance. To date, county government has been very
supportive of the measure and has even decided to make a piece regarding
zero lot lines a part of the county-wide subdivision ordinance. The rest of the proposal has been
generally accepted and is otherwise gaining momentum. The proposal now goes to the State for their
blessing before coming back to the commissioners for their official approval. If approved, it will then go back to the
state to become an official ordinance.
- The benefits subcommittee met
earlier last month and also with several officers of the department
regarding the two benefit proposal changes. These proposals involve the bereavement
policy and the PA and PL polices.
The subcommittee will report to the full board at the September
Fire Protection District Board meeting.
- We ran into a small problem when beginning to
execute the staff vehicle rotation for this year. (We actually moved the process up a
couple of months this year so we do not run into the end of the year like
we did last year when we rotated the three Battalion vehicles) In working with our three quoters on the project, we discovered that the 2006
models of the Ford Explorer (the smaller vehicle we switched to last year
in lieu of the Expedition) now have the transmission selector mounted on
the floor between the two front seats.
This obviously presents a significant problem as we are not able to
mount the radio stack console in that location. We have tried several different
approaches including ordering special transmissions, re-working the radio
stack, and switching vehicles altogether.
Ford recognizes the problem faced with all public
safety agencies using the Explorer and have begun a sort of
‘complaint log’ on the issue. They
claim that if enough are received, that have been known in the past to
re-engineer a product to accommodate.
However, this would not happen for some time and will not solve our
problem this year. So, to make a
long story short, and after several discussions, we have decided to stay
with 2005 models this year and begin the process of what we will do for
next year. This will give us some
time to determine what will be the best course of action will be. As an added benefit, we can still get
2005 models (although they are being “swallowed up quickly by public
safety” according to our Ford representative because of the problem, at a
further reduced rate. We are also
in negotiations regarding the trading of the older vehicles in lieu of
outright selling to see which is a better deal.
- Now that each of the board members has had some
time to hopefully read through the first draft of the department’s
Strategic Plan, President Shufflebarger has requested that it be brought
up for an initial discussion. The
topic has been added to the agenda for the September Fire Protection
District Board Meeting.
- Chief Brown has been working with a land
developer and Josh McCarty on land for the southwest portion of the
district. He will have an update at
the September Fire Protection District Board meeting.
- As from last month, I am re-printing the wish
list of un-budgeted capital projects that have been updated (as quotes are
received). As you may recall, in
year’s past we have put together an un-appropriated project list
containing items and/or projects that weren’t originally budgeted. These items are then prioritized and
funded with either under-budget or un-appropriated funds on a per-item
approval basis. As the year goes
on, I keep a list of these requests (sort of a wish list) as they come in
and compile them toward the end of the year. I thought I would share this list with
you now as it stands. (They are in
order of submittal and have not yet been discussed by the Senior Staff as
to their necessity) The project
cost estimate is included with each item.
1. $13,000 – Mast camera and control for TSU for
incident recording.
2. $6,000 – ID card printer for ID cards (in lieu of
utilizing Greenwood City Human Resources).
3. $50,000 – Additional appropriation for Station 52
room addition project.
4. $12,000 – AED Pro (x4) to serve as backup
monitor/defibrillators on all primary apparatus.
5. $6,000 – Safety Trailer grant contribution (our
portion of the grant).
6. $10,000 – Audit for 2003 and 2004 Volunteer
Corporation (approved amount at the June, 2005 FPDB meeting).
7. $6,000 – Conversion kits for all M-Series
monitor/defibrillators to allow 12-lead ECG’s to be
sent via fax to the hospital.
8. $85,000 – Small garage/structure to house all
non-take home vehicles and trailers currently parked outside at HQ.
9. $1,000 – Personnel photo board utilizing professional
photography for display at HQ.
10. $18,000 – Thermal Imaging cameras (x2) to be placed
on the remaining primary apparatus.
11. $5,000 – Turnout gear washer for Station 52.
Total: $212,000
- That’s it for this month. See you at the meeting…… Scott