PORT ANGELES — The proposed formation of a regional fire authority, which would consolidate the Port Angeles Fire Department and surrounding Clallam County Fire District 2, needs more planning before it is brought to voters, a joint committee has decided.
Originally expected to be a question on the August or November ballot, the planning committee now projects that a plan could be ready for a vote in fall 2012.
The year’s delay will give the planning committee — composed of three Port Angeles City Council members and the three Fire District 2 commissioners — more time to understand what services will be provided at what cost and to whom, according to a statement dated Friday.
To find out what residents want, Clallam County Fire District 2 will conduct three town hall meetings next week and is encouraging people to fill out a survey, said Fire Chief Jon C. Bugher on Tuesday.
“With rising costs, fewer volunteers and an increased demand for services, the fire district commissioners are seeking input from the rate payers regarding their service expectations,” Bugher said.
“In partnership with our constituents, we want to develop a working plan of action.”
The survey, available at the fire district’s website at www.clallamfire2.org, asks what kinds of services — such as medical, fire and education — are most important to residents and what kinds of services they would pay for.
“We aren’t here to push the consolidation or to push a levy or anything like that,” Bugher said.
“We just want to know what services people want and what they are willing to pay for.”
The meetings are scheduled at 7 p.m. Wednesday, April 27, at Mount Pleasant Grange, 2432 Mount Pleasant Road; at 7 p.m. Thursday, April 28, at Dry Creek Grange, 3520 W. Edgewood Drive; and at 9 a.m. Saturday, April 30, at Black Diamond Community Club, 1942 Black Diamond Road.
“We are really encouraging people to take the survey, to come to the meetings and tell us what they want,” Bugher said.
One question on the survey, for example, asks about the importance of emergency medical services.
Emergency medical service response time was lauded as one of the benefits of consolidation in 2010 but is not currently funded under the 61-cents-per-$1,000-assessed-valuation fire levy, Bugher said.
“We pay for everything under that levy now, but with rising costs, we need to know what is most important to people and what they are willing to pay for,” he said.
The city also has some questions to answer.
The Port Angeles Fire Department will work with the city’s finance department to determine how a regional fire authority would affect the city, Port Angeles Fire Chief Dan McKeen said Tuesday.
Services such as city attorney, maintenance and some others are provided by the city and sometimes are paid for out of the city Fire Department’s budget.
Service pay?
He said it was unclear whether the city would continue to provide such services, if the regional fire authority would pay for them or if those services would be obtained outside of the city government.
“We need to find out how the regional authority would affect the city,” McKeen said.
“Questions like that need to be answered,” he said.
The Port Angeles City Council and Clallam County Fire District 2 Board each passed resolutions in 2007 to create an ad hoc committee to explore the feasibility of consolidating the two fire districts.
The panel recommended asking voters to approve formation of a combined taxing district called Port Angeles Fire & Rescue.
The panel said consolidation would cut response times, primarily through the 24-hour staffing of District 2’s now-unstaffed station at Deer Park and partial staffing at its Dry Creek station west of the city, they said.
It also would eliminate the District 2 chief position and combine the two volunteer emergency medical service contingents into one 84-person service.
High property taxes
And it would mean higher property taxes for District 2 residents, with county taxes increasing from 61 cents per $1,000 of assessed valuation to about $1.35 per $1,000, while city property taxes would remain about the same.
A joint planning committee was formed in August to develop a plan to form a regional fire authority.
The planning committee is made up of fire district Commissioners David Whitney, Thomas Martin and Dick Ruud and City Council members Brooke Nelson and Pat Downie with Mayor Dan Di Guilio.
Both McKeen and Bugher said they and the planning team are still meeting regularly and all hoped to determine what would work best for everyone.
For more information about the survey or the county district meetings, visit the website or phone 360-417-4790.
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Reporter Paige Dickerson can be reached at 360-417-3535 or at paige.dickerson@peninsuladailynews.com.
