Sumner fire district seeks a solution
Published 12:41 pm Thursday, December 11, 2008
By Teresa McCallion
The Courier-Herald
The Sumner Fire Department may ask Bonney Lake for more than just back up for fire and medical emergency calls. The city's 15-member crew is recommending a two-pronged solution to their staffing problems: hiring additional firefighter/paramedics and negotiating with East Pierce Fire and Rescue to contract out all of a portion of its administrative services.
Currently, emergency crews from Bonney Lake and Puyallup provide back up, but depending on their neighbors that heavily is not a long-term solution, Sumner City Council members were told at a Jan. 10 work session.
The council learned that coverage, measured by response times, is inadequate. While it should take rescue crews eight minutes or less to arrive at the scene of an emergency 90 percent of the time, response times of as long as 20 minutes have been documented in Sumner. Units responding to fire and aid calls met the target only 77 percent of the time, in part because calls relying on mutual aid extends response times.
Sumner mayor Barbara Skinner admits her city occasionally struggles to cover calls and must take a hard look at staffing levels.
In 2004, East Pierce responded to 142 calls in Sumner. Puyallup responded 115 times. The cost of those calls is not reimbursed. Instead, emergency responders participate in a county wide mutual aid agreement with the idea that the districts would help each other.
Although Sumner is not experiencing explosive growth, an aging population is creating additional emergency calls. Skinner also points to the increased number of emergency calls due to accidents on local highways, attributing 10 percent of the calls in Fire District 1 to accidents on state routes 410 and 167.
To help discuss possible options, East Pierce Fire and Rescue Fire Chief Dan Packer was asked to attend the Sumner City Council work session Monday.
Everyone is short-staffed at one time or another, Packer said. Although he acknowledged the East Pierce units were going to Sumner more often than Sumner was coming to Bonney Lake.
When East Pierce units are called to Sumner, adjustments are made to ensure coverage in Bonney Lake.
However, it is not a permanent solution. Sumner will still need to hire more people, Packer said.
"We do not have excess staffing," he explained.
The Sumner council faces a deadline for their decision. Director of Fire and Emergency Medical Services Steve Stringfellow announced plans to retire effective March 31. The council must decide if it will conduct a search for a replacement or consider an interlocal agreement with East Pierce. The agreement could combine administration services.
Sumner Councilman David Enslow feels the critical issue is to get more service on the street.
"We need Indians, not chiefs," he said. "How do we plug the hole in the fire department? We need to do that immediately."
Last year Stringfellow's request for an additional three firefighters in 2005 plus three more in 2006 was not included in the city's $51.3 million budget.
Still, some on the council were surprised to hear the situation had become this critical.
"This was the first opportunity we had to brief the council," Skinner said.
Six of the seven council members were in favor of expanding the department, asking the city to investigate funding options.
"The financial director is hoping to have it next week," Skinner said Friday. "It's going to be a few more weeks before we can get it put together, but this is our number one priority right now."
The council and Packer had nothing but praise for the Sumner firefighters.
"Our interest is in helping them. If there's any we can help through a particular arrangementŠwe are happy to do that," Packer said.
The Sumner City Council and the fire department expressed concern that anything that appeared to be a merger would result in the loss of community identity with their own fire department. Packer reassured those in the meeting that an administrative services contract is largely invisible to the citizens, except for some improvement in service.
"There's no loss to the community by the change of management," Packer said. "The citizen doesn't really care about the sticker on the door. What they really care about is how quickly can you get here, how well will you be trained and how you will solve their problem."
Enslow is not so sure.
"We have a lot of tradition and pride in the Sumner Fire Department. It might be a problem for some people," he said.
Sumner's mayor admits she has some concerns as well.
"It's a very personal kind of decision we are making," she said.
Skinner said the city is just starting the process of discussing ideas.
"Hopefully we can get it sorted out quickly," she said.
"It's not a crisis, but it certainly is a wake-up call," Enslow said.
Any agreement negotiated with Sumner would have to be approved by the East Pierce board, Packer added.
East Pierce is the lead agency of the Tri-district, which includes Fire District 12 covering the Buckley-Bonney Lake border to Carbonado and District 20 in South Prairie.
