Buena Vista, Va (Nov. 19, 2009) - City Council member Frankie Hogan placed a motion on the floor to approve the city's participation in the Rockbridge Regional Fire and Rescue Commission directly after a public hearing on the same subject received zero public comment.
"This is the culmination of an effort which started last December....this is what has come about and I recommend its approval."
The motion received a second from council member Sam Mays...and then questions was council members started putting the whole issue in some serious doubt.
Councilman Larry Tolley opined that, "I feel obligated to ask some questions." Tolley wanted to know if fire and rescue service would be improved as a result of the new commission and if citizens of Buena Vista would still be "hard billed" for rescue services from the city of Lexington.
Said Hogan: "Buena Vista citizens will always pay until we get a joint services agrement with the city of Lexington."
Tolley responded, noting that "the problem here is the BV rescue squad's answering of calls. If they go unanswered, the calls roll over to Lexington's rescue squad. Then Tolley asked why if the BV Fire Department had 10-15 ETS if they could answer calls, thus cutting down on billings from Lexington.
It seems however, that the BVFD is the only fire department in the region which is not licensed to do this. "If the BVFD could do this, it would be less of a burden on the citizens of Buena Vista," he said. "As long as we don't allow the fire depatment to assist citizens, it will be costly."
But BV rescue squad official Ronnie Slough stepped up to the podium to answer. "Since February, our response to citizen (calls) has improved tremendously. 'We've never turned down anybody who wanted to help us," he noted. "Lexington bills us very seldom any longer. We are "hard billed" because we have no agreement with Lexington. We do have fire department members help us."
That opinion and statement was backed up by fire chief Tommy Keiser as well.
Another important question came from council member Lewis Plogger who wanted to know if the BV Rescue Squad's membership had been polled on the question of the creation of the proposed commission.
According to Slough, the BVRS' membership had not voted on the issue, but would do so soon.
It was obvious that several council members were not pleased to hear this. Then it became clear that the BV Fire Department's membership also had not voted on it either. Council members then became even more concerned.
Said councilman Tolley: "Do we lose control in this process?"
Said Slough: "We want to do the right thing. I undesand what you're staying. I hear it cleaerly." Slough also told council that his group was not in favor of hard billing, but indicated that "it's tough for some of the squads to the south of us to answer calls because members work outside of the area. In short, a "soft billing" process would rely on voluntary payments or just the payments that would be received from insurance companies without the balance being forced to be paid by citizens. "This has a long way to go," Slough noted.
Indeed.
Councilman Plogger expressed concern about the BVRS answering calls, both in the city of Lexington and in the county and "don't get a nickel for it." Then Slough told council that about 1/3 of the squad's calls were in the county. That brought the issue more into focus.
Tommy Keiser said that some firefighters may be concerned about the "Commission and eventual 'authority creep.'"
And nobody seemed to be able to answer Plogger's question "what is it about this commission that will help you to do things better?" Slough indicated that some supplies may be able to be purchased a bit cheaper and that eventually, pooled money might help generate money for future equipment purchases.
It was clear then that the motion wouldn't pass at that point.
Eventually, a motion to table the issue was passed with Hogan not withdrawing his initial motion, but Mays withdrawing his second of his motion to end the matter.
Mayor Mike Clements said that, "We're losing some control is what we're saying," and city manager Tim Dudley noted that the city could get out of the commission upon a 90 day notice.
Council will deal with the issue at its December 17th meeting after it receives the results of the votes of the memberships of the BVRS and BVFD.
In other council action:
• Chief of Police, A. J. Panebianco was appointed to another term on the Regional Jail Commission by a unanimous vote.
• Public Works Diretor Mike Cosby explained to council that the area Health Department had notified the city of the failure of the city's highest producing water well of quality standards, resulting in the city going into action to bring another well back into production. That well, known as the French Post well, would suffice for city needs in the meantime, he suggested, but about $11,000 in electrical upgrades needed to be done to make sure it could continue to produce.
Council later passed a declaration of emergency which allowed it to bypass normal rules to take action to get engineering work done for a proposal to get a filtration facility put into place at the Dickenson site, instead of having to go through the Reqeust for Proposals Process, thus saving months of time. That's the good news; the bad news is that constructing a new filtration system for that well could cost up to $2 million.
The Dickenson well's quality has apparently decline since last February with the apparent problem being surface water entering the flow.
According to Cosby, "We've been able to operate fairly seamlessly," but, he added, that was because fall and winter water demand is lower than that in the summer. "We may have to have water conservation measures" then, he noted.
The solution, even if funding were to be quickly received, might take up to 18 months. The well's water would have to be treated like it came from a lake or river.
The city may consider taking other alternatives into account, even the drilling of a new well, but said Cosby, "a filtration system is the most realistic solution." And, he noted, "At a small cost, we could bring the Hall Spring back. This would be a good opportunity to bring it back" online. No word yet if the city was moving in this direction.
Some of the first steps which need to be taken is getting a Preliminary Engineering Report (PER) and then an Environmental Report, both of which will be needed for an agency like the USDA Rural Development to consider partial funding of such an effort.
"Probably, their (USDA Rural Development) is the most logical. Realistically here, we're talking about loans,' Cosby said. He also said that the quicker the reports could be finished the faster USDA could consider the concept. Cosby estimated the cost of a PER to be about $24,980 with about $4,000 more for an environmental report.
If the city doesn't move properly, the Health Department would enforce a 'boil water notice", requiring all its schools and facilities like local restaurants to have to boil water for their operations. According to councilman Plogger, "a boil water noticed would affect everybody."
City Council and the city staff are putting their heads together to "consider all options.
• an expanded and more specific definition for inoperable vehicles and how they must be concealed was passed by unanimous vote. Basically, those with such items need to have a good screening fence of 6-8 feet in height. Exempted is any licensed business regularly engaged in automobile sales, scrap or salvage which has been around since Juen 26, 1970.
|  | BV Fire Department Chief, Tommy Keiser, showed up at the city council meeting to discuss aspects of the proposed Rockbridge Regional Fire and Rescue Commission. (J. E. Clark photo)
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