April 26, 2024
By: Dwayne Page
A new county fire truck!
During Thursday night’s meeting, County Fire Chief Donny Green asked the budget committee to allocate from the county’s capital projects fund in the 2024-25 budget year $425,000 for a new or demonstration (with warranty) fire engine.
With the support of the County’s Health, Education, and Public Welfare Committee, Chief Green laid out for the budget committee the three most immediate priority needs of the county fire department and a new fire truck is first on the list followed by the need for 75 portable radios for the new TACN system if not funded by a grant and an additional allocation of funds to put toward a proposed new public safety building to house a fire truck in the Wolf Creek Community.
“After considering the greatest needs of the DeKalb County Fire Department and receiving concurrence with the Health, Education, and Public Welfare Committee at our April 4 quarterly committee meeting, we are recommending these immediate priority funding requests to the Budget Committee for capital projects that will provide the most critical overall benefits to the communities we serve”, said Chief Green.
According to Chief Green, the county has not invested in a new fire truck since 2012 and its important to do so occasionally to stay on a replacement schedule.
“The first immediate priority need, as recommended by me and the Health, Education, and Public Welfare Committee is a new fire engine in the amount of $425,000,” said Chief Green. “That is not a fire engine that we would specify. Its one we would probably have to buy that is a spec unit already built. The reason we would probably go with that is it will probably take way less time to get one of those delivered as it would if we ordered one with our detailed specifications. I have talked to three manufacturers and the turnaround time to get one of those after placing an order is anywhere from 18 months to 24 months,” said Chief Green.
“The last time the county bought a new fire truck was 2012. We have 11 of our 17 front line apparatus that are over 20 years old but I don’t pretend that all 11 of those need replacing right now. I don’t really go by age or even miles on them. I look at functionality of the truck and how long we can make it work,” Chief Green explained. “We are not too good to buy used trucks. Most of our fleet came from used apparatus but in this replacement cycle we have to occasionally put in a new truck or we will have all of our fleet at one time that becomes very aged. That is the reason I am asking for a new truck this year. Two years ago we got a Rural Development truck on a grant and that helped in our fleet but we are a large department with 12 stations and a lot of apparatus we need to keep a rotation on. We cannot continue to have across the board old apparatus and if we do we will hit the wall at once and have to start looking to buy five or six trucks at a time instead of one,” Chief Green continued.
“I haven’t asked for a new fire truck in a while but I think its time. This would be a spec truck. A general truck. If we were to spec one and order specifically like we would want it designed the price would be over $500,000 so we are trying to be as efficient and conservative as possible in asking for a new truck and keep it as basic as possible while still having the functionality we need for a new fire truck,” said Chief Green.
If the county funds the purchase of a new fire truck, where would it be stationed?
“The way we place our trucks, we have an order based on which station is due to get the next truck, how old their truck is, and if they have ever had a new truck in their station before. This truck would be due to go to the Cookeville Highway Station. That station has never had a new truck. They have always had the hand me downs. All the five original stations that were started in 1975 have all at some point received a new truck except for the Cookeville Highway Station,” said Chief Green.
With a new fire truck, one of the older engines could be used to replace the department’s reserve truck that is now out of service.
“Our reserve engine that we have right now has been out of service for over six months,” explained Chief Green. “It’s a 1987 truck that we got from Brentwood when Mike Foster was County Mayor but we cannot find parts for it now. When we had our last fleet apparatus check done that we do annually through a third party company, they failed the truck and told us to not put it back on the road so we don’t have a reserve truck,” said Chief Green.
“ISO (Insurance Services Office) gives us points in our insurance rating for having a reserve apparatus in our fleet, so we need to have a reserve truck. Operational wise, if I have any one of our 12 stations fire trucks go out of service without a reserve truck, I don’t have a spare to slide in and take care of that which happens frequently. Last year we had an engine go down and we were without it for about eight months and that station was without coverage. Its important to have a reserve truck especially for a fleet our size with 12 stations that covers 305 square miles. This new fire truck will let us take one of our oldest apparatuses out of service, put it into reserve status, and get rid of the old reserve truck that is not working,” added Chief Green.
The budget committee has not yet acted on Chief Green’s request.