The Falcon Fire Protection District held its regular board meeting Dec. 12. All board members were present except for Greg Heule, who was deployed to the Fern Lake fire.Director Phillip Theodore has accepted a job offer out of state and tendered his resignation from the board. Theodore expressed his appreciation for the opportunity to serve the district. Kelly Starkman, board president, thanked Theodore for the expertise he brought to the board and his service to the district. The board will announce in January how they will select a successor to fill Theodore’s term, which ends in May 2014.Dick Stuart reported that a state engineer inspected the dam at the Spirit Lakes pond and found no problems related to the possible installation of a dry hydrant for fire department use. Resident concerns about the dry hydrant proposal will be addressed at the Spirit Lakes Homeowners Association board meeting in January.Chief Trent Harwig reported that the budget is on track, with†92 percent of the fiscal year complete. Harwig anticipated total expenditures at $35,000 to $40,000 under budget by the end of 2012.FFPD conducted one school program and hosted the final community CPR class for the year. Firefighters attended a school lunch at the Patriot Learning Center and met with the principal to review severe weather procedures. About once a month, five or six FFPD firefighters meet with students over lunch. While there, firefighters also do walk-throughs to familiarize themselves with school buildings and fire alarm systems.Lt. Rob Riege and Battalion Chief Vernon Champlin attended the 2012 Colorado State Fire Chiefís Leadership Conference. Lt. Matt Gortner completed his company officer leadership certification, which is the culmination of a three-year training program. Gortner and firefighter Cody Thomson attended a training session called ìThe Art of Reading Smoke.îDirector Henry Allen thanked the FFPD crew that drove Santa Claus to a community event for children hosted by District 49 in December.FFPD responded to 1,675 calls as of Dec. 12, with station No. 1 responding to 828 alarms and station No. 3 responding to 847 alarms. Medical emergencies accounted for about 68 percent of total calls and 5.5 percent were fires. The remaining calls were classified as false alarms, good intent, service calls and other situations.Response times in District 1, which has the highest concentration of the population, are averaging six to six-and-a-half minutes. District 3ís average response time is seven minutes, while District 5 in the northern part of the district averages 20 minutes. Response times are calculated from the time FFPD is dispatched to the time the first FFPD unit arrives at the emergency scene.Fire prevention efforts were part of strategic plans discussions. Theodore said that while B shift does a great job handling the majority of FFPDís fire prevention activities, the board should discuss options for sharing that workload across all shifts.Champlin reported that the Tri-Lakes Monument Fire Protection District has withdrawn from the original group of nine local fire districts seeking to adopt the 2009 International Fire Code and is moving forward on its own. Harwig said this shouldnít have any effect on code adoption efforts by the remainder of the group, and pointed out that Tri-Lakes Monument is different from FFPD in terms of funding, staffing and water resources.On Jan. 7, FFPD will meet with representatives from the county attorneyís office, the housing and building association and county land development services to discuss fire flow requirements, land use codes and enforcement of fire flow codes in existing subdivisions. FFPD also hopes to hear from HBA, which has not yet responded to FFPD comments on the 2009 IFC amendments since they were submitted Aug. 7.The board adopted a resolution to formalize the posting of public notices for regular board and pension meetings in three public places, including FFPD headquarters. Notices will also be posted on the FFPD website.The FFPD budget has been publicly posted since Oct. 15 to provide district residents with an opportunity to review and comment. No public comments have been received, and none were offered during the budget hearing.Some of the items included in the 2013 budget:
- A 2 percent salary increase for full-time personnel
- Funding for full-time fire marshal and training chief positions
- An anticipated increase in the cost of benefits
- Volunteer pension funding
- Replacement of an aging cascade air system that lacks the capacity to fill newer firefighter air bottles, and for which parts are no longer available
- Protective equipment (bunker gear) replacement
- Radios
