Questions raised about real need for Windsor-Severance fire district mill levy
of the
reject a mill levy increase that would fund the staffing of the fourth and eventual
fifth station for the district. This is the subject of ballot measure 7A.
A yes vote would
decrease response times closer to top-of-the-industry standards, but there are
some questions about whether that's necessary for a district like that of WSFR.
Some of those questions
come from an expert living in the district.
engineering and management consultant. He's worked for 40-plus years in
and has concerns.
Fire chief
has answers for the questions, but it's going to be up to voters to decide how
to best use their money.
The class system
Fire departments use
several different analysis metrics to determine their efficiency and efficacy.
One of the more universal analyses is called the Insurance Service Office, or
ISO, classification. ISO is measured on a scale of Class 10, the worst, to Class
1, the best, and it's used to determine homeowner's insurance rates.
Class 1 is an absolute
top-of-the-line fire district designation. It's a measure of response times,
water supply, communication systems and risk reduction.
In
rated fire districts, only eight, the top 1.4%, are rated class 1.
ISO Class 2.
As of
was also rated Class 2, at least within the boundaries of
town limits. Addresses outside of town limits but within 1,000 feet of a fire
hydrant and 5 road miles of a station are rated Class 3. That's with three
stations.
"Why does a Class 2
district complain they need to improve?" Graham said. "It's
money."
However, Kazian said the
push for a fourth and eventually fifth fire station isn't about getting up to Class
1 -- he agrees that'd be nice but unnecessary for a low-industry area like
"Our current rating
is 80.59," Kazian said. "That's less than half a point into being Class
2. To get to 1, we'd have to go all the way to 90. We could be Class 1 someday,
but we're not chasing Class 1. We have a very easy ability to slide back to Class
3 without hardly anything different."
Between selling the
district's ladder truck -- Kazian said that happened before he came on as chief
and he's working on getting one back -- and not having quick access to the
growing southern part of
located, Kazian said it's a teetering situation between Class 2 and Class 3 for
the district's in-town ISO rating.
"We add a station,
we can get more personnel on scene quicker, meet those time standards, this
improves," he said.
But Graham doesn't quite
buy it.
"What I'm saying is
residents don't understand what that means," Graham said. "They're
buying something that isn't going to have an impact on them. The old firefighters
look at the two new stations and call the 'Taj Mahals.'"
Response times and quantities
Another metric used to
analyze fire districts and departments is an Annual Compliance Report, or ACR.
WSFR's ACR, provided to the
response times already. But Kazian said there's important room for growth.
On urban fires, the
first truck on scene in 2018 arrived within 4:33. Comparing that to Poudre Fire
Authority, which services
illuminating. PFA's first-engine response time in 2018 was 8:04.
Red White and Blue Fire arrived in 8:10.
fire response teams.
The time to a full
"effective response force" in urban fires was much more comparable,
though, and that's the statistic that Kazian said was far more significant. It
took WSFR 13:23 to get the full firefighting force present. That's a few ticks
less than
(11:59) and nearly 5 minutes more than Red White and Blue Fire (8:45).
Rural fires, in which
WSFR only competes with Red White and Blue in this particular small sample,
also saw faster response times from WSFR, which arrived in 9:13 compared to Red
White and Blue's 14:25 response time for first engine on the scene. WSFR was
also much faster in effective response force times, 13:17 versus 18:05.
This data begs the
question of how much room for improvement -- or need for improvement -- there is
for WSFR.
"The underlying
assumption is the
fire and emergency response services without an increase in the mill
levy," Graham wrote in an email. "The need for an increase has not
been substantiated by data. To the contrary, the data supports the existing
staff and resources are more than capable of providing for the people and
property of the district."
Perhaps even more stark
is the number of fire responses. Between both urban and rural fires, WSFR
totaled just seven fire calls in 2018. That's compared to 42 for
Kazian clarified that
was the number of fire calls to which the department responded and found an
actual structure fire. They responded to 72 fire calls in 2018, he said, it's
just that the vast majority didn't end up being as big a deal as a structure
fire.
However, fire response
is a substantially smaller usage set for WSFR than medical calls, and medical
calls in the area mainly served by Station No. 4, southern
projected to improve their response time dramatically for those 2,500-plus
calls per year.
According to WSFR data,
without Station No. 4, the response time sits at just shy of 7 minutes. With
Station No. 4, if an Emergency Medical Services unit is housed at the station,
response times would dip to just more than 3 minutes. Station No. 1's area
would also receive an improvement -- from 4:23 on medical calls to 3:31 with the
addition of Station No. 4.
Kazian contends that
that's critical.
"Our response
times, they're not amazing," he said. "When you're not breathing and
it takes an average of -- try holding your breath for 4:23, or even just the 57
seconds difference from 4:23 to 3:31. I guarantee, the difference between the
new response times we're predicting and where you'd be without Station 4 --
imagine 4 minutes faster in those areas. That's a medical call."
But even the quantity is
an issue in Graham's eyes.
"Station 1
responded to an average of 1,860 calls a year," he wrote. "Or about
five calls per day. Station 2 (
less than one per day. Station 3, which is located near
average calls per year, or about 1.3 calls per day. The new station would be
expected to answer 418 calls per year, or 1.2 calls per day
"As comparison,
Poudre
day.
about 6 calls per day."
Snowball effect
As important as any of
this, Kazian said, is the compounding impacts of adding a fourth station.
The availability of
ambulances increases with this fourth station, meaning when two calls come in
at once, the geographically vast region doesn't require an ambulance returning
from, for example,
force times are drastically reduced because, simply, there are more secondary
responders closer to the emergency.
"One fire I looked
at from (2018), it needed Loveland to come get on the scene to get to the
number identified for effective response force," Kazian said. "If we
had Station 4, we'd have been there so much quicker. It's not just a closer
station, we'd have three stations on scene with nine to 12 firefighters in a
much shorter window than we can today. It's an exponential effect. It compounds
on itself."
But ambulance and
medical calls don't impress Graham. As he pointed out, the hospitals operate
the ambulances in the WSFR district, and firefighters who respond are there to
assist. But he's still billed by the hospital if he has a medical incident that
requires ambulance assistance. The mill levy isn't covering that.
The cost of it all
It all comes down to
whether the cost is worth the benefit, as with anything.
By 2026, after all three
incremental mill levy increases have taken effect, the owner of a home with
taxes than he or she would be without the mill levy. On a home assessed at
"It's not a
whimsical 'It'd be cool to have another fire station' thing," Kazian said.
"The data shows us the impact and the need."
The ACR does indicate in
its strategic recommendations section that Station No. 4 be completed to best
serve the residents of the district.
Either way, it's
incumbent upon voters to determine the value of these various truths when
weighted against each other.
The election is
___
(c)2019 the Greeley Tribune (Greeley, Colo.)
Visit the Greeley Tribune (Greeley, Colo.) at www.greeleytribune.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Cigna Expands Its $0 Premium Medicare Advantage Plans to New Jersey
P/C Industry Surplus Sets New Record In First-Half 2019
Advisor News
Annuity News
Health/Employee Benefits News
Life Insurance News