Agenda - 12-03-2012 - 5a - Laserfiche WebLink

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5 1 Eno Fire Chief Bryan Baker said that he agreed with Dan Jones. He said that when they 2 were building new stations they did ask if a bay should be built in the station but were shot 3 down by the county. He said that there is no need to build those new stations when bays can 4 be added on to existing stations. 5 SORS Chief Matthew Mauzy agreed with Dan Jones and Bryan Baker and said that South 6 Orange Rescue Squad currently co-locates at least one Orange County ambulance and 7 sometimes two or three. He said that the problems that have been experienced are entirely 8 with the lack of expectations being set. Going forward with a clear understanding up front can 9 resolve all of the potential issues. 10 Commissioner Yuhasz said that this demonstrates to him the need to address the 11 question of how Emergency Services and first responders are to be managed in this County. It 12 is time to define the expectations. He asked if the Emergency Services Work Group should 13 take this on. 14 Commissioner McKee said that this may be something to look at but he is reluctant to 15 expand the scope of the work group at this late date. He said that there is a contract 16 negotiation in progress with Orange Rural Fire Department at this point with the county. He 17 said that Orange Rural wished to have a contract that is spelled out, delineating all 18 responsibilities, etc. 19 Commissioner Yuhasz said that managing expectations has huge policy implications for 20 the County. He thinks that it needs to be done on a countywide basis to have a consistent 21 policy among all of the departments and a clear expectation among the departments, County 22 Commissioners, and the citizens regarding the role of all three entities. 23 Eno Fire Chief Bryan Baker said that his recommendation is not to take it in front of the 24 Emergency Services work group but with the Fire Chief's Council because there are other 25 members on the Emergency Services work group like the Sheriff's office and police 26 departments that are not familiar with this topic at all. He said that the first responder program 27 needs to be ironed out. 28 Commissioner Foushee agreed with Chief Baker and said that she does not think that the 29 Emergency Services Work Group is the place for this to occur. 30 Commissioner McKee agreed and said that the work group was given very specific 31 directions and objectives. He would like to move forward with the objectives and sunset the 32 committee. 33 Commissioner Hemminger said that this issue needs to be resolved and the County 34 Commissioners need to endorse that it should happen. 35 Chair Pelissier said that everyone is in agreement that this issue needs to be addressed 36 and Michael Talbert needs to work with the fire chiefs for an outline toward their goals. 37 Michael Talbert said that there is a pending agreement between Orange County and 38 Orange Rural and it does address some expectation issues, compensation, and sharing of 39 locations. It is in legal review now. The hope is that this will be used as a template. 40 Michael Talbert made reference to contracts and said that on June 5th, three contracts 41 were cancelled — North Chatham, Chapel Hill, and Carrboro. All three of those were given a 42 year's notice with the idea that the contracts will be redone. He thinks that it would be fair to not 43 put this in the work group and get 3-4 representatives from the Fire Chiefs Council, 44 representatives from Emergency Services, and representatives from the management of 45 Orange County and sit down and work out these issues. These contracts that are redone can 46 then be used as templates next year to redo the rest of the contracts that go back to 1992. 47 Chapel Hill Fire Chief Dan Jones said that he agreed with Michael Talbert on the 48 reworking of the contracts. 49