No fire aid agreement
By Anna Krejci, Dells Events
The Delton Fire Commission considered again a request for an automatic aid agreement between the Delton and Kilbourn Fire Departments at a meeting Tuesday but ended by tabling the issue and voting to revisit it in a year after new changes to its mutual aid policy have been in effect.
The commission rejected the automatic aid proposal for now, citing concerns over staffing and additional costs that may be incurred.
At a meeting in May, Kilbourn Fire Department Chief Tory Wolfram requested the commission consider the automatic aid agreement. Under automatic aid, fire fighters and fire trucks from a department would automatically assist its neighboring fire department by responding to a building fire in its neighbor’s jurisdiction. Fire fighters and equipment from both departments would be dispatched at the same time. The number of fire fighters and the number of fire trucks that would go would be determined by the fire chiefs before an emergency.
Wolfram told the Dells Events in a previous interview that an automatic aid agreement would ensure that enough fire fighters arrive to a fire while also potentially trimming minutes off of response times.
Under a mutual aid agreement, which the Kilbourn Fire Department and Delton Fire Department currently have, an incident commander on scene of a fire determines on a case by case basis whether to summon help from a neighboring department.
Delton Fire Chief Andy Schultz has said he prefers working with the Kilbourn Fire Department under the existing mutual aid agreement. He has cited concerns over using too many resources — fire fighters and equipment that might be needed for another emergency — on one fire under an automatic aid agreement.
The Delton Fire Commission agreed with Schultz that they didn’t want to commit the fire department to an automatic aid agreement right away, and some commission members expressed that it might never be a good idea.
“I don’t think we need it,” said commission member Marv Giebel.
Commission member Larry Volz sought for alternatives to the automatic aid agreement. He suggested relying on the police in departments in Lake Delton and Wisconsin Dells who work all the time and probably are the first on the scene of a fire to communicate with fire departments about response.
Commission member Tom Diehl said he favored operating the Delton Fire Department under a newly clarified mutual aid policy stipulating that the Kilbourn Fire Department is to be called for help on a structural fire if it is in the village of Lake Delton. But he said an automatic aid agreement could be considered again in a year.
Diehl said an automatic aid agreement could turn out to be costly for the Delton Fire Department because by nature the agreement calls for no reimbursement for costs between departments. The Delton Fire Department happens to have paid, on-call fire fighters while the Kilbourn Fire Department is comprised of volunteer fire fighters.
Delton’s costs could “skyrocket,” Diehl said.
He also said the departments differ in management and labor problems could arise.
Diehl said automatic aid is good for some departments, but may not be good for Delton and Wisconsin Dells.
“In concept I think automatic aid is good if you have full time fire departments A, B, C, and D, and they’re there 24 hours a day. It’s a little bit different animal than what we have,” he said.
Schultz said something similar to automatic mutual aid, yet different in that it won’t deplete too many resources of any one department, is the Mutual Aid Box and Alarm System, or MABAS. MABAS may be enacted among departments in Sauk County, Schultz said. He said it requires fire chiefs to develop plans for summoning help from a number of nearby departments in anticipation of a large emergency. Each plan is coded so incident commanders and dispatchers know which departments should be called to assist.
In an interview Thursday, Kilbourn Fire Chief Tory Wolfram said he accepted the Delton Fire Department Commission’s decision and would wait for future discussions.