New fire district seems off to a sure-footed start

No social, commercial or governmental function remains static for very long, given the exponentially accelerating pace of today’s world. And that certainly includes the closely allied public safety functions of fire suppression and emergency medical aid.

Our nation’s fire and ambulance services traditionally relied largely on volunteers — historically, farmers, shopkeepers and the like, who could drop things on a moment’s notice. As late as the 1980s, volunteers accounted for 80% of total staffing and virtually 100% of rural staffing, limiting paid professionals largely to major metro areas.

But changing conditions have combined to render that dangerously deficient today, if not outright unsustainable in most places. Factors include a predominance of corporate office and factory employment, a vastly higher volume and proportion of medical aid calls, higher standards of fire science and medical aid application, more sophisticated technology requiring costly gear and extensive training, and growing demand for specialized disaster, rescue and hazardous material response.

As career firefighter and chief Fred Hertel observed in a 2019 Viewpoints commentary, it’s not your father’s fire service anymore.

That’s why Newberg signed on with Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue in 2016, joining a district serving more than half a million residents with nearly 500 firefighters working out of 29 stations in four counties. It’s why McMinnville’s urban and rural agencies joined two years ago in creation of a smaller-scale version serving 40,000 residents spread across 95 square miles.

The new McMinnville district quickly began moving administrative operations into 25,000 square feet of newly acquired space out by the airport, freeing space at its main station downtown to house a larger contingent of paid firefighters. It has begun beefing up both its firefighting and medical support staff, modernizing its communication system, upgrading its advanced life support capabilities and laying plans to hire more medical specialty personnel, freeing firefighting resources from an ever-growing volume of medical calls.

Perhaps most important of all, the district moved right out of the gate to develop an updated master plan, just presented to its board for initial review, and plans to follow up with a strategic plan to guide implementation.

Commendably, it didn’t wait a moment longer than necessary to implement one master plan recommendation either — that it up the minimum staffing requirement on first-response fire engines from two to three.

The 230-page master plan report termed crews of two insufficient, saying that “can delay safe and fast completion of requiring initial tasks during dynamic emergency situation.” Chief Reed Godfrey responded by ordering the change, effective immediately.

Being the new kid on the block, it is facing more than its share of challenges. They include an almost 40-year-old main station with undersized bays, an increasingly congested operating environment, a lack of training facilities and expansion room, and maintenance needs projected to run nearly $2 million over the next 10 years alone.

But at a time when it can take governmental agencies years to develop a master plan — and that plan can remain largely if not entirely shelved when the time comes to produce a successor — we like what we’re seeing so far from our fledgling fire district. Here’s hoping it can remain on track and continue its forward momentum.