The Newcastle Fire Co. hopes to replace two aging trucks: a 1979 Ford/FMC pumper and a 1982 GMC medium rescue with a rescue pumper that would perform both functions.
According to a Jan. 4 letter from Newcastle Fire Chief Clayton Huntley to Town Administrator Ron Grenier, the Company hopes to prepare specifications in order to open bidding March 1 and award the bid April 13.
Huntley, in a Jan. 17 phone interview, estimated that a new rescue pumper built to the Company’s specifications would cost as much as $319,000.
Grenier and the Newcastle Finance Committee replied to Huntley with a 35-page packet including questions, requests for documents and analysis, copies of related news articles and commentaries and advertisements for used fire trucks.
Requests from the Finance Committee include all “minutes, documents and analysis performed” by the Newcastle Fire Co. Truck Committee, an inventory of the Newcastle Fire Co. fleet including calculations of the cash value and remaining useful life of “each piece of apparatus,” a list of fleet maintenance expenses for the last three calendar years, storage details, an estimate for the cost of insurance for a new rescue pumper, the number of “active volunteer personnel” in 2010 and each of the prior four years, the number of structure/dwelling fires by year from 2005-2010, the total number of calls by category, the number of volunteers who responded to each fire, the number of fires that required mutual aid, Newcastle Fire Co.’s response time to each fire and a comparative analysis of the Damariscotta Fire Dept. fleet.
The committee asked if Huntley explored “the used fire truck marketplace,” if purchasing a truck built to specifications was “considerably more expansive [sic]… than all other approaches to purchasing,” and if Newcastle Fire planned “to do any fund-raising, grant-writing, etc. to help defray the cost of a new vehicle.”
Notably, the committee asked Huntley to “explain… how the current mutual aid system” works and suggested collaboration between the Newcastle and Damariscotta fire services.
“Wouldn’t an ‘automatic mutual aid’ approach between the Twin Villages address both the [Newcastle Fire Co.’s] manpower and equipment needs…?” the committee asked. According to the document, Damariscotta Fire Chief Neil Genthner Jr. is or will be “considering or proposing the purchase of a new pumper.”
The committee cited polls showing support among Maine citizens for collaboration and consolidation of services. The documents also cited existing “automatic mutual aid” agreements in the towns of Brewer, Holden and Eddington and other “geographically contiguous” communities.
Huntley and the Newcastle Fire Co. Trustees plan to compile as much information as possible and submit it to the Finance Committee in time for a Jan. 26 meeting. “It’s a little short notice,” Huntley said, referring to the finance committee requests, which arrived as an attachment to an explanatory Jan. 10 letter from Grenier.
“[The Finance Committee has] had notice of about two years on the purchase of a fire truck coming up,” Huntley said. According to Huntley, information about the impending necessity appeared in the 2008 and 2009 town reports.
Huntley responded to the Finance Committee’s concerns and suggestions in the Jan. 17 interview, calling the purchase of a new truck “a matter of public safety and firefighter safety.”
“We have historically stayed away from used trucks,” Huntley said. “You never know what you’re getting when you buy a used truck.”
Recently, Edgecomb bought a 1992 truck for $10,000, a fact the Newcastle Finance Committee pointed out. According to Huntley, however, the bargain truck came with a blown engine and other major issues.
Huntley called the practice of purchasing 10 and 20-year-old trucks “the band-aid effect.”
“The theory sounds good but it never pans out,” Huntley said. “We don’t believe in the band-aid effect.”
As for collaboration, according to Huntley, Newcastle is already party to an automatic mutual aid agreement with neighboring towns. Huntley served on the committee that drafted the agreement in 1981, he said.
Huntley explained the mutual aid system in a Jan. 18 interview at the Newcastle fire station. Following an initial fire alarm, Newcastle firefighters respond to the scene and Damariscotta firefighters respond to the Damariscotta fire station.
After the second alarm, the Damariscotta Fire Department and the Central Lincoln County Ambulance Service respond to the scene and Nobleboro and Wiscasset firefighters respond to the Newcastle station to stand by.
The system continues up to eight alarms, ensuring continuous coverage of each town.
“Mutual aid is a very good agreement but it’s a very sensitive one too,” Huntley said. “When Damariscotta calls for a pumper they don’t want us to send a 30-year-old pumper over there.”
Twice in 2009, Newcastle’s 1979 pumper broke down while firefighters attempted to respond to structure fires in Damariscotta.
At present, maintenance of the two vehicles the Company plans to replace is a slow, expensive process. “We can’t buy parts,” Huntley said.
In recent years, the Company has purchased rebuilt parts or ordered custom-made parts in order to service the vehicles. At one point, the pumper was out of service for eight weeks while awaiting repair. “That’s life and limb,” Huntley said.
The recommendation to purchase a new rescue pumper “doesn’t come lightly,” Huntley said. Newcastle’s volunteer firefighters, including the Tansicot Engine Co. Trustees and the members of the Truck Committee, are all Newcastle residents and property taxpayers and feel the impact a large capital expenditure can have on the mil rate. “That’s a lot of money,” Huntley said.
Huntley will meet with the Newcastle Finance Committee Jan. 26 at 6 p.m. at the town office.
On Jan. 18, Grenier and the Newcastle Board of Selectmen sent a separate letter to Huntley. The letter includes additional questions and comments relative to the Newcastle Fire Co.’s recommendation to purchase a new rescue pumper.
The Jan. 18 letter requests information about a 2010 Ford F-250 and raises questions about the “timing, sequence and authority” of the bid process as outlined in Huntley’s Jan. 4 letter.
