A new fire truck for Mt. Pleasant

Feb. 04--The Mt. Pleasant Fire Department will soon have a new fire truck in its garage.

The city's board of commissioners approved the purchase of the truck for $139,000 last month.

"Now we can communicate with them to get this truck finished the way we want it to," Fire Chief Tim Smith said. "I think everything is lined up. This company has a good reputation."

The truck, a 2004 Rosenbauer with a 60-foot ladder, will be purchased from M 3 Fire Apparatus in Lawrenceburg and will be delivered to the city within 60 days.

"It is being completely remodeled and rebuilt all the way down to the tires," Interim City Manager and Chief of Police Michael Hay said.

Smith said with the large industrial facilities in the city, the new truck's 60-foot hydraulic extension ladder will give the department a significant advantage in fighting fires at those complexes and at taller three story homes.

The new truck allows firefighters to work in a more secure environment for safer rescues and water drops.

The city's current tallest ladder reaches 35 feet.

Mayor Bob Shackelford asked if the department could call in a truck from Columbia if a fire is too much for Mt. Pleasant's resources.

Smith said it would take up to 25 to 30 minutes for a similar truck from Columbia to arrive at a fire in Mt. Pleasant.

"In the fire service, minutes save lives," Smith said.

Smith said the truck, which is usually priced at more than $500,000, was used by a fire department in Ohio until it was in a wreck less than one year ago. However, the only damage to the truck was cosmetic.

"We never dreamed we could afford this kind of truck," Ricky Frazier said.

Finance Director and City Recorder Loretta Garner said the fire department's yearly budget of $36,000 for vehicle maintenance and repair is able to cover the $24,000 payments over a six-year period.

The fire department can choose from two warranty plans at coverage for six months with a $5,000 cap on maintenance or coverage for 12 months with a $2,500 cap.

"The best part is if we have a problem, we can just drive to Lawrenceburg. It's just a good deal," Smith said.

The new truck will replace an aging Grumman model that has been used by the department for 27 years and has a broken pump.

With the new arrival, MPFD will have a total of three operating trucks with the combined capacity to run 3,500 gallons of water per minute to a burning structure.

Smith said it will allow the city to keep its current ISO rating of three. The rating system was developed by the Insurance Service Office, a for profit organization providing reviews of fire departments and law enforcement agencies across the country used by insurance companies to calculate their rates.

The ratings are created by gathering data from the amount of training each firefighter has had to the distance between hydrants.

The system is based on a scale of one to 10, with one rated as the most secure and 10 being the least.

If the city's ISO rating were to drop to a two, Smith said, some of the city's residents might see a reduction on their insurance rates. However, those rate drops would be much less than when the city went from a rating of six to three.

Commissioner Mike Davis said he contacted the Farm Bureau, which informed him that their rates would only lower if the structure was within a 1,000-foot radius of a hydrant.

"I think we will be able to see a variety of uses for the truck once we get it," Smith said.

The purchase of the truck was approved in a 4-1 vote with Shackelford voting in opposition and Vice Mayor George Vestal, Commissioner Delores Blankenship, Frazier and Davis voting in favor of the new truck.

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