North Canton fire district holds annual meeting Monday

Mountaineer (Waynesville, NC)

March 22-- Mar. 22--The North Canton Fire Department will hold its annual meeting at 6 p.m. Monday, March 25.

Fire Chief Steve Kelley said the meeting will be more of an open house where all the department financial records will be open for review, and an update will be provided about upcoming events.

This fire district includes the communities of North Hominy, Beaverdam, Thickety and Newfound, and the district strives to have board members from each of those areas, Kelley said.

"Our board is a little different," Kelley said. "We have 13 members with eight community representatives and five firefighters. We try to keep geographical representation on the board."

During the meeting, the board election will be held, as well. Firemen representatives are elected for a one-year term, and there is no term limit on the community representatives' term.

Board members who are no longer interested in serving let the chairman, who is currently Dennis Williams, know in advance so others who have expressed interest in serving can be contacted, Kelley said.

The all-volunteer department works with a $302,000 budget, and Williams said there are no major changes in store for the coming budget year, which begins on July 1.

"We purchased a replacement fire truck at the end of last year and we've got two more years to pay off two other trucks," Kelley said. "A lot of people don't realize how much these trucks cost. We paid $365,000 for our last truck."

Most of the North Canton Fire Department's equipment is between 25 and 30 years old, an age that national standards consider worn out.

There is a 7-cent per $100 of property levy assessed on all property within the district boundaries. While districts have the power to request up to 10-cents per $100, Kelley said the North Canton board is very fiscally conservative.

"They try to stay the course and be good stewards of the money," Kelley said. "A main concern is to keep the rating low so property owners can save on their insurance."

The department has a split rating of 5/6, which means all the residential properties within the district have a 6 rating and all commercial properties can get a 5 rating when purchasing insurance coverage.

"The state doesn't recognize anything under a 6, so our insurance rating is the best you can have," Kelley said.

One of the factors in the insurance rating is the water availability. As a rural district, North Canton has no hydrants available, but does have the capacity to bring what Kelley calls 10,000 gallons of "rolling water" to a fire scene either on their own trucks or on trucks from other departments with which they have mutual aid agreements.

"The big thing for a rural fire department is having water," he said. "You either need a river or a pond you can pull from or you need to have water coming to you in tanker trucks."

The North Canton Fire Department has 32 volunteers on the roster, with about a dozen certified emergency medical technicians. The only paid help is to keep up with all the administrative work departments are required to file.

The department responds to about 750 calls a year, the majority of which are on I-40.

"We have 10 miles of interstate in our district," Kelley said. "That's the majority of our calls. We have a lot of fires, but there's also a lot of wrecks."

Kelley invited all in the community to drop by the fire station at 1685 N. Canton Road Monday to participate in the annual election, learn more about department operations and meet the firefighters who are on standby in the event disaster strikes.

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