The Board of Commissioners took the following action at their March 21st meeting:

• Approved the Fire Commission's recommendation to eliminate the Facilitator position and provide for the Fire Commission to elect a Chair and Vice-Chair annually from among the voting membership. As you may recall, the Fire Commission selected Ann Suggs as its Chair. At our meeting in May, the Fire Commission will need to elect a Vice-Chair.
• Approved the Fire Commission's recommendation to provide for an alternate appointment for the President of the Wake County Fire Fighters' Association.
• Received a report from the Board of Commissioner's Public Safety Committee. The report directed staff to bring back an open burning ordinance to the Board. As discussed at the last Fire Commission meeting, the ordinance will be shared with the Fire Commission before it is submitted to the Commissioners.

The Fire Commission discussed a short and long range staffing plan. The plan will be pursued with the cooperation of the County budget office and the Wake County Fire Departments.

The short term goal of the Fire Service Staffing Committee is to identify departmental needs as they relate to staffing beginning FY 05-06. The proposed goal is to allocate monies for the placement of personnel to equate to a four person engine company for each fire department on a twenty four/seven day per week basis throughout Wake County. Some examples of implementation are volunteer incentives, stipend programs, funded duty-crew programs and/or paid personnel.

The long term goal is to allocate monies for the placement of personnel to equate to a four person engine company for each fire station on a twenty four/seven day per week basis throughout Wake County. This will be implemented using volunteer and/or paid personnel.

The criteria for reviewing staffing needs will include:

1.    Review of existing staffing levels.
2.    Review of the call ratio between EMS and Fire.
3.    Review of response times.
4.    Review of the number of structure related fire responses.
5.    Review the availability of a volunteer pool of active members.

The recommendation to the Fire Commission is to:
    
1.    Look at alternatives to the existing operating expense model.
2.    Re-allocate Heery study funds.
3.    Re-allocate funds currently directed to new fire station construction.
 
Next Fiscal Year, 2006-2007, the Wake County Apparatus Committee slated our Engine 4 to be replaced. This vehicle will be replaced with a vehicle that is considerably longer. As it is now, EMS 204 and Engine #4 barely share the same bay.

The next is staffing. This can be as early as FY 06-07. If the County Staffing and Facilities Committee determines that there is a need for 24 hour Duty Crew or Paid Staff provisions, we will need to address additional sleeping quarters. The Wake County Financial Analyst and Wake County EMS have been contacted for the simple fact that this may affect upcoming budgets.

Several thoughts that we may need to considered are:

1. Consider adding onto Station Two, if the Property Owner agrees.

a) EMS Funding; for adding bay space for EMS, for adding sleeping quarters for EMS.
b) FD Funding; adding bay space for FD, adding sleeping quarters for FD.
c) Cost Sharing between Fire Tax and General Fund; adding bay space for both FD and EMS, adding sleeping quarters for both FD and EMS.

2.  Relocating EMS 204 to Station One.

As a follow up to the Medical Dispatch Issues, on March 24th, the Fairview Fire Department met with the local 911 centers and members of EMS and Fire Department agencies to discuss the medical dispatch issues.

After much discussion and a review of the most recent concerns, the Raleigh/Wake 911 Center agreed, effective immediately, to process all medical calls they receive in the center. The call taker will enter the incident into CAD and determine the appropriate EMD determinant for dispatch. The Fire/EMS telecommunicator will retrieve the incident and determine the recommended medical and 1st Responder units. If the medical unit is not a unit dispatched from the Raleigh/Wake 911 Center, they will notify the appropriate 911 center via TRICOM relaying all dispatch information for dispatch. The 1st Responder unit will be dispatched simultaneously. There should be no delay in getting the 1st Responder enroute to the call.