Fire standards

A no-frills firehouse in Waynesboro’s west end could halve response times there, but the fire chief is skeptical of the City Council majority’s plans to staff the station with a dozen volunteers.

Fire Chief Charlie Scott says it is difficult to recruit and retain volunteers who already have full-time jobs.

But the majority bloc of Mayor Tim Williams, Vice Mayor Frank Lucente and Councilman Bruce Allen are concerned that the cost of paying for an additional 12 full-time firefighters would cost the city in excess of $600,000 yearly. When factoring in benefits, the average yearly compensation for city firefighters is about $58,000.

“From my perspective, the fire chief and staff may have to compromise, because I don’t see us hiring 12 more firefighters while I’m on council,” Williams said. “I can’t support that.”

Scott says he has been consistent with staffing information, and maintains that even without building a substation he needs more personnel. In the current budget, he asked for, but did not receive, money to add three firefighters, though he did get money to add a deputy fire chief.

Currently, there are three shifts of 10 firefighters each, a deputy chief, an administrative assistant and Scott. In addition, an average of eight to 15 volunteers supplement department forces. Industry standards, according to Scott, are for the city to operate with 51 total firefighters. Staunton has 31 full-time personnel – three shifts of nine people each and four administrative personnel, along with 12 people who work part-time. Both have overall budgets near $2.3 million each.

“I will certainly follow the will of council,” Scott said. “However, my recommendation will be that we adequately staff to the industry standard to our fire department. Currently we are not doing that. And to think that we can somehow do that at two different locations is, I guess, not theoretically possible.”

The majority on the council say Scott will likely have to divide up the department’s equipment and recruit more volunteers. But Scott, even as he says the department would continue to recruit volunteers, explains that it is difficult to find people who are already working full-time to sacrifice their time for the fire department.

The building

A 4,000-square-foot fire substation that opened three years ago in Staunton could be a model for such a facility in Waynesboro’s west end as a way to save money.

Lucente originally suggested the Staunton substation as a low-cost, yet fully functional model during a recent City Council work session with the two architectural firms hired by the city to work on the project.

Council members, including Lucente and Williams, have expressed confidence that the firms can design an inexpensive facility that cuts down on response times.

“I’m looking for whatever we can build and stay under budget or at budget,” Williams said. “I was encouraged ... that they have built fire stations for $1.5 million or $2 million.”

City voters in November 2007 voted in favor of taking out a bond of around $2.5 million on the west end station.

Williams said he would like to see the cost of the substation stay at around $700,000 – the cost to build the Staunton substation – to allow for unexpected expenses. Staunton paid an additional $450,000 to buy the Grubert Avenue property for its substation.

Lucente, who prior to the referendum opposed the west end station, said he wants a no-frills, metal building similar to Staunton’s – meaning it would staff an engine company, a rescue squad and sleeping quarters for the firefighters.

“I see a lot of fire stations made out of metal buildings,” Lucente said. “I see a lot more of those than I do Taj Mahals.

Allen agrees, but he and Councilwoman Nancy Dowdy said the location should have room to expand. Scott said that, of the more than half-dozen sites being looked at, the top two to three priority sites would allow for expansion.

“For me, I don’t want us to be too short-sighted and find ourselves in a situation where we’re going to be back at the table in two or three years,” Dowdy said.

Ken Newell of Stewart Cooper Newell Architects, an architectural firm headquartered in Gastonia, N.C., said construction costs would run from $170 to $180 per square foot.

Councilwoman Lorie Smith and Dowdy both said they want to see an environmentally friendly building that’s pleasing to the eye. Williams said he would support that as long as the project stays under budget. Smith and Dowdy do not believe building green would cost more.

“From my perspective, I want this substation to be something that is efficiently built,” Smith said. “I’d like to see us employ some green initiatives in this building that will be cost-efficient, that will give us payback in the long-term.”

Newell said his company is Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, certified and can incorporate green principles at whatever level the city wants within its $2.5 million budget.

Smith said she wants to revisit the items Scott has previously identified as necessary for a new substation. Those items include space to hold the city’s antique fire truck, an exercise room, administrative offices, public parking, a fill station for their self-contained breathing apparatus, a police substation and a training room.

In the substation proposal done several years ago, Scott said he asked for an 8,000- to 10,000-square-foot substation, but says the size could vary depending on the architects’ recommendations. The current West Broad Street station is 16,000 square feet.

“It was a professional judgment made from experience, from going to classes, seminars, from seeing other stations and facilities,” Scott said.

At a minimum, Scott says he would need to house a four-person engine company – meaning 12 people to cover three shifts – as well as sleeping quarters and office space for a 24/7 operation.

The substation proposal also called for reserve engine space and possibly locating an Emergency Medical Services vehicle there, depending on the outcome of future conversations with the Waynesboro First Aid Crew.

City Manager Mike Hamp has said it would take 14 to 24 months to sort through substation siting and design issues before construction could begin.

Response Times

Lucente said the priority of a new station should solely be response times.

A good response time is considered to be four minutes or less within a 1.5 mile radius of a station, Scott said.

He said that, of the sites under consideration, response times to the west end would drop by about 50 percent from the six to 10 minutes it now takes to get to the farthest west end location from the current station.

Staunton saw an almost immediate improvement in response times once its new substation opened in 2006. Prior to its opening, response times to its west end ranged from seven to nine minutes, according to the Web site Firehouse.com. After it opened, response times dropped to two to four minutes.

Insurance costs

Lucente does not believe a new facility would improve Insurance Services Office, or ISO, ratings – the industry standard for rating fire departments. Many insurance providers factor ISO ratings into property insurance premiums.

In fact, the use of volunteers could potentially hurt a department’s ISO ratings due to possible delays in communication and getting to the firehouse. The ratings give credit for personnel available for the first alarm of a fire.

Scott agreed with Lucente, in part.

Residential costs would not change, Scott said. However, he said it would cut costs for commercial businesses.

Mike Waters, ISO vice president of risk decision services, qualifies the possible improvement.

He said ISO’s classification system is based on three things – the local fire department’s engine companies and the amount of water a community needs to fight a fire (50 percent); how a department responds to calls and dispatches its resources (10 percent); and a community’s water supplies (40 percent). ISO uses the information to rate a locality’s fire protection from Class 1, or exemplary, to Class 10, which does not meet ISO’s minimum criteria. Waynesboro is currently rated a Class 4, while Staunton is rated a Class 5.

Waters said, in general terms, “an improved protection class can lead to lower premiums [with] all other factors remaining equal.”

Loretta Worters, vice president of the Insurance Information Institute, said the average insurance cost for Virginia homeowners is $662 yearly, compared to $804 nationwide. There is no average rate for businesses in the Waynesboro area, she said, as many variables go into determining those rates.

“The fire chief may be correct in that it may reduce an ISO rating and perhaps reduce business insurance rates,” Worters said. “It could reduce residential insurance rates as well.”

Any savings on an improved ISO rating, Worters said, would depend on how insurance companies review the rating, the loss or amount of claims a homeowner or business has had and the type of home or business being insured.

“Each company makes its own determination,” Worters said.

LEED Building Certification

SOURCE: INSURANCE SERVICES OFFICE AND INSURANCE INFORMATION INSTITUTE