Excerpts from the Record-Eagle.com:
The board for Grand Traverse Metro Fire Department approved a policy to begin charging neighboring fire departments between $1,000 and $5,000 for every two-hour stint a Metro fire truck spends responding to a fire outside the boundaries of the member townships of Acme, East Bay, and Garfield. The decision to charge was triggered by the disparity between the 25 times Metro gave support to surrounding fire departments during the past year compared to the five times it received aid.
“Mutual aid is exactly that, if we give you aid we can expect aid in return,” said Metro Fire Chief Pat Parker. “But as you can see from the numbers, we really haven’t had that.”
Grand Traverse County operates on what’s known as a box-response system where the county is divided into 80 geographic boxes and fire department response is assigned in advance based on the severity of each incident. The initial call triggers a first alarm. Larger fires that require more resources would escalate the event to a second, third, or fourth alarm.
Metro will charge $1,000 for the first two hours at a second alarm, $5,000 for a three-alarm fire, and $2,500 for a four-alarm incident. The bill would be $2,500 per hour after two hours. Board members also asked to change the boxes so Metro Fire no longer is called to respond to first alarms outside of the three townships.
“So many first alarms are just an investigation of a fire,” Parker said. “There’s no reason for us to be rolling our trucks out. Any established fire department should be able to handle those types of calls.”
Parker said the main reason Metro Fire is called to a first alarm is because they staff their stations 24 hours per day and not all of the surrounding townships have that same level of service.
“There is a level of readiness that our townships are willing to pay for and to give that readiness away to your neighbors without charge doesn’t seem right,” Parker said. “I think you are going to start seeing some changes throughout the county.”
The board passed the changes on Dec. 22 with a 3-2 vote. East Bay Township Trustee Beth Friend, chairwoman of the fire board, said everyone agreed to start charging but there were some disagreements over the particulars. Friend said the department won’t be the first to charge for mutual aid.
“Blair Township charges, and they have a good relationship with their neighboring jurisdictions and that’s what we anticipate as well,” Friend said. “We anticipate that jurisdictions not charging for mutual aid currently will follow suit and we welcome that.”
Grand Traverse Rural Fire received 12 mutual aid calls, most to Whitewater Township, and likely will feel the greatest impact from the decision to begin charging. Blair Township received aid seven times this year and gave it twice, while Traverse City received aid five times and returned it once.
#1 by Tom Foley on January 4, 2016 - 10:41 PM
You might run across a few of my other comments about mutual aid. In theory, I think MABAS is a great system. And, for the most part in IL it seems to function well from the casual observer.
However, as Jim points out, it’s become too easy for towns/cities to rely on mutual aid as if it were their own. And, if it is truly mutual, I’m ok with it.
But, you’re seeing towns getting rid of their aerials and ladders. Of which, several aren’t staffing anyway so I understand the excess. So what happens? A town that gets rid of their aerial will call in another town’s apparatus for mutual aid when the need arises. The other town or district, mind you, that staffs the ladder and pays for the apparatus.
Mind you, this isn’t everywhere. And, there are even some instances where two towns are jointly purchasing a tower/aerial but is housed in one town. I support this idea and find it equitable.
So, to the post about what’s going in Michigan, I absolutely could see a solid rationale for charging a neighboring department if mutual aid is not… well… mutual or at least within reason.
The best part of mutual aid for me is being organized and ready for major incidents. This is well-established and something we should proud of here in Illinois.
Finally, from a fiscal point of view, smaller neighboring towns should abandon the idea of their own departments. I know that’s a tough pill to swallow, but consolidation of resources just makes sense. Think of all the reserve apparatus that exist in MABAS10, as an example. Perhaps they could share a reserve engine or ambulance when the need arises reducing acquisition and maintenance costs.
#2 by Drew Smith on January 4, 2016 - 5:01 PM
MABAS-IL is not idential to MABAS-MI so I cant speak about MABAS-MI governance. In Illinois MABAS-IL really has no enforecment power. Any perceived abuse would need to be addressed by one department telling the other its intentions. Under the MABAS master agreement a department responds only when they are able.
I dont think MABAS impairs or impedes any consolidation effort. In fact, many MABAS divisions have functional consolidations such as regional dispatch and special teams. I thinkt the real impairment to consolidation is politics and kingdoms which is not exclusive to just elected officials.
#3 by Jim on January 3, 2016 - 6:16 PM
Drew,
How does MABAS handle departments that close stations or cut manpower and then turn to automatic or mutual aide to fill in? Do you think MABAS is a band aid to a full consolidation?
#4 by Bill Post on January 3, 2016 - 2:29 AM
In my opinion, one of the best mutual aid and automatic aid systems is in the metro Phoenix Arizona area where not only are the fire departments dispatched from the same center, but they don’t recognize municipal boundary lines and send the nearest available apparatus regardless of the department. Even though each department is autonomous with their own chief, they train together and are dispatched like one large department.
#5 by Drew Smith on January 2, 2016 - 10:08 PM
I won’t give an opinion of whether this is a good or bad idea as I don’t know the whole story. However, the situation in that area is not at all similar to the Chicago area. First, Grand Traverse Metro Fire is three townships with five stations and is a combination FD. They are surrounded for the most part by Grand Traverse Rural Fire, a volunteer FD. GT Rural covers nine townships out of five stations. You can find a map of the layout here http://gtfire.org/map-of-service/ There is one other FD, Blair Twp, that is sandwiched between GT Metro and GT Rural.
I am not sure which department used GT Metro for mutual aid but when GT Metro’s five stations are surrounded by an area that is many times greater 25 calls may not really be that much. I get there is a cost. The question is WHO called them and how often and why? Is the work spread out amongst the five stations? Is the requesting FD asking because they can’t muster enough help?
A few other observations:
Traverse City FD has five members on duty each day out of two stations and is all full time and Union. They cover the most populated area but its size is a fraction of any one township.
Blair is combination and the only FD that seems to run its own ALS transport ambulances.
I saw a Help Wanted ad for a fire chief in Long Lake, one of the nine townships making up GT Rural. Couldn’t find anything else to that story.
MABAS-MI is far less along in their development than IL and WI. See this map for details http://www.mabasmi.org/index.php/divisions It is interesting to note GT County is only one of three counties in the northern third of the lower peninsula.
In the end, once again I am thankful that our fire service in the greater Chicago area is in many ways well ahead of many other in the U.S.A.
#6 by Jim on January 2, 2016 - 4:33 PM
Brian,
I don’t see what is unreal about it. Too many municipalities are cutting and relying on “mutual aid” for their fire protection. It is not every other municipalities problem. MABAS to me was a band aid when departments started cutting. This stalled a full consolidation that sooner or later will happen and makes much better sense.
#7 by Brian on January 1, 2016 - 4:15 PM
Good to see MABAS in Michigan is working well. Unreal. If they are on my box cards, time to remove them.