City Reviews Fire Mutual Aid Agreement, Insurance Rate Report
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Jennifer Peryam-jperyam@timesuniononline.com
Warsaw City Council reviewed a mutual aid interlocal agreement for fire services Monday night. The agreement provides for mutual aid and assistance to assure adequate protection during times of emergency including, but not limited to, meteorological, seismic or other natural disasters. The agreement is between Warsaw-Wayne Township Fire Territory and Elkhart, Fulton, Marshall, Pulaski, St. Joseph and Starke counties. It states the parties in the agreement will provide equipment and personnel to a requesting jurisdiction. This is without a contractual obligation to be reimbursed or an expectation or a reimbursement for the first eight hours of an emergency or disaster event. Mike Brubaker, Warsaw fire chief, provided an Insurance Services Organization report prepared by R.W. Bassett & Associates. The organization provided an update to a study done in 2009 regarding the formation of the Warsaw-Wayne fire territory. Brubaker said the fire territory has purchased a piece of land on CR 200S, west of County Farm Road, located at the southwest corner of Warsaw Community Church for a third fire station. Brubaker said the immediate goal of the fire territory should be to improve its ISO rating to a class seven or better rating in the township. This would save the township residents approximately 20 percent off their fire insurance premiums. If the fire territory reaches a class 5 ISO, then the homeowners would be in a position to receive insurance rates similar to the city homeowners and businesses. Recommendations are to move the aerial ladder truck from station two to station one to provide better coverage to all parts of Warsaw, and develop a program to hire part-time firefighters to supplement the full-time staff and increase the staffing numbers on all shifts. This improvement could be accomplished by building the proposed station in the southern part of the township. Also during the meeting, the council approved a $6,134.52 reimbursement of funds for volunteer efforts Warsaw firefighters Aaron Bolinger and Nate Iden provided Oct. 28 and Nov. 2 in New Jersey for Hurricane Sandy relief efforts. The reimbursement is from the state of New Jersey for $1,880 for equipment and $4,245.52 for staffing. The council heard a Warsaw-Wayne fire territory activity report with 121 responses for January.
