Security Industry News >> EMERgency24 Inc.

Barre, VT, Considers Billing for Fire Services

City councilors in Barre, VT, are considering an ordinance that would give their fire chief broad authority to bill people for a range of services his department currently provides free of charge.

In a move designed to boost revenue, councilors have agreed to discuss an ordinance that would enable the local fire and ambulance department to be reimbursed for responding to everything from false alarms and fender benders to someone summoning an ambulance because they'd fallen out of bed.

Currently those sorts of calls create a detectable drain on the department – accounting for a fair share of its call volume without any mechanism for the city to be reimbursed for its time and trouble.

That would change under an ordinance that will be read for the first time at next Tuesday's council meeting.

The proposed ordinance, which has occasionally been discussed, but never acted on in recent years, is a priority of a coalition of council members who recently lobbied Mayor Thomas Lauzon to make its adoption a high priority. Councilors Randy Copping, Scott Gagnon and Peter O'Grady have all voiced support for the ordinance that Lauzon admitted this week was "long overdue."

The ordinance, which is currently in draft form, would be administered by Fire Chief Peter John and invoices for services provided would be mailed at his discretion and be payable to the city within 30 days.

If adopted the proposed ordinance could create a significant new expense for owners of properties with sprinkler systems, fire alarms and smoke detectors that are directly wired to the city's public safety building triggering an automatic response from firefighters.

Although the ordinance would allow for three such "nuisance calls" per calendar year, false alarms at large structures, like North Barre Manor, Central Hotel, or the former Rouleau Granite plant on Metro Way, could easily generate an invoice well in excess of $1,000 based on hourly fees of $42.50 per firefighter and $175 to $300 for various fire apparatus. It is not unusual for 10 or more firefighters to respond with two or more fire trucks and occasionally an ambulance when an alarm sounds at one of those larger properties.

Those same fees would not apply in the event of an actual fire, unless it was a car fire, a "non-permitted burn," a "permitted burn" that got out of control due to negligence or a "wildland fire" that was caused by negligence.

The proposed ordinance also seeks to recover expenses associated with the department's routine response to most motor vehicle accidents, as well as non-emergency calls, ranging from "lift assists" to false calls from Medical Alert activations.

According to the draft ordinance, an invoice based on the department's level of response to motor vehicle accidents would be generated, and in the event of a multiple vehicles are involved pro-rated at the discretion of the fire chief among the drivers and vehicle owners involved.

Although both city residents and non-residents could be billed for the department's response to accidents where traffic tickets or citations are issued, only non-residents would be billed if no police action is taken, according to the proposed ordinance.

The proposed ordinance also anticipates an hourly fee of $130, not counting manpower, for non-emergency "medical assists." Lift assists – helping elderly residents who have fallen are among the more common non-emergency calls with many of them generated by tenants of subsidized housing owned and operated by the Barre Housing Authority.

The proposal would also create hourly fees for both "malicious incidents" and "special events." The latter category represents a range of non-emergency events where emergency personnel are required to be present as a precaution. Malicious incidents could range from someone intentionally setting a fire to setting off a fire alarm.

The council will discuss the proposed ordinance when it meets next Tuesday at 7 p.m. in City Hall.