County Council - workshop

Call to order the York County Workshop for September 14th, 2025. Our item for a business is discussion regarding the York County Fire Service long-term vision and strategic plan. I understand and I know that management sent over some information for Council 345. You guys want to present some information first before getting started? Is that right?

Good question. First of all, I think most of the folks that I see in here are from the fire service background. It's good to have folks in this room. I think that what... However you want to go about asking this question and going around from each council, I will tell you the sense of what I saw from council when it came to budget time is that we... We were in a position where we were being asked to make a budget decision about a particular area of a fire department that would have resulted in 39 individuals becoming employees of the county. And so I think at that point in the budget discussio

OK. Are we going to work our way down the line, I guess? What I would expect for an outcome would be the most efficient, both in response times and money-wise, and manpower. The use of all of those, the most efficient use of those to protect the citizens of your county. Yes, I realize different areas have different requirements, but that's what's taken care of in this. What role the county should play is, as you said, the umbrella view. This haphazard shotgun approach, while it would work when we had lower populations and more spread out, I just don't find it to be an efficient use of resource

And 7 tax districts. So that's a whole lot of messed up, just spread out governance there. And I just don't find that to be useful.

Grand finale right here. Okay, I want to give a shout out to my Flint Hills boys for a job well done in a townhome fire that could have been a disaster last week. A mother with a brand new baby was in that townhome. Everybody's safe. Both town homes on both sides were damaged. But I've never seen so many fire trucks in my entire life. They came from everywhere. And it was actually in my backyard. So it was an interesting time. It's going to help with our referendum, showing the people in the community firsthand, a real firsthand experience of what a fire department needs to be capable of doing

No, no. I mean, I agree with a lot that they said, but... When this all first started coming up way even before y'all were even here, I never even knew that we had a problem. I mean, and so far right now, can anybody in here answer to me when a fire, I asked you earlier today, didn't get took care of and whatnot? I said from the get-go that the EMS and all was more of a bigger problem that we needed to tackle than the fire. But my idea is a little bit different since I've been here my entire life. And I remember fire departments as being part of the community. A lot of these places are sitting

I think we still need to discuss and refine. And I ain't saying this in one term to make anyone ill, mad, or whatever. But after my dealings through the years, not only on the federal side with the milk and all that, and ever since I've been on capital and all, I don't see where government does anything efficiently. And I've told y'all that before. Y'all know I've said that. I mean, anything that you go to do, it costs three times as much, everything else. And I'm not going to let up on the fire departments. I mean, a volunteer is a volunteer. If you want to get paid for it, then that's anothe

Again, my concern is We've got 16 districts. So I went through and read a whole lot, many white papers and reports and things on the consolidated districts and everything else. I understand how they work, but I don't see how you can have one county then have a consolidation with 16 different districts with all sorts of different inputs there with the tax boards also being thrown in there on seven of them. There's just so many different pieces that you're trying to govern and none of them are governed alike. The rules at one are different from the rules at another. And I'm still not satisfied o

It's not going to work as long as communities continue to get ripped apart. I mean, I used to be a volunteer, but that's years ago. But it's like a lot of things. You just got to have a heart and a willingness wanting to do it.

provide them and give them the help with whatever training and assistance that they need, help them with getting the new recruits and placement in. I still go back to the reason the tax districts come to be was to make up that shortcoming and that gap of their population in their area increasing you take like me we over on the western side we don't have the revenue and all. So if you ever tried to do this one model for everybody, you're going to take away from everybody over yonder to help us out over here on our secluded side. Do you get what I'm saying? I'll admit we're the growth and we're

I think at this point, I don't know that I would object to the conceptual, here's a framework. I think the problem that this council is having is that we've got to get out of the conceptual and into the actual details, because whether It's not as if we can change this overnight. It's required that we have planning and that we understand what we're looking towards. We're meeting two goals, an ISO requirement, and we're meeting a response time for fire, which I will say, and I think folks do mix them a lot. They mix an ambulance call with fire service. They are very different. The way our system

Obviously, ISO is ISO. I mean, that's an outside source that says you have to do this in order to make sure that folks' mortgage insurance fits.

So are you thinking, kind of what I'm hearing is that we should wait to establish a more uniform umbrella once all the districts have their own tax boards? Is that kind of what I'm hearing?

So I'll say this. I met with Flint Hill when their issues were coming up right at the budget time. And I met with Bullocks Creek when I understood some of their concerns. And I think you see a complete, totally different needs. But I think more than anything, What we have to do, and we have to do it now, is we have to do an assessment of where we are because I heard the question asked, is our fire service performing and are they doing well? We have a lot of folks that like to argue about things, but are they making the fire calls and are we getting to the fire calls? My understanding is that w

That would be fine. How did it ever get to the point where we as council were supposed to be the ones that the tax districts answered to? Same difference. Bring before us what each one is and We have proved that they meet that standard.

I think it might be helpful if we're starting with this for us to, and I don't mean to short circuit the plan, but how long would it take to gather that data so that we have a baseline of information?

But I go back to what you said earlier. Let's say we get these standards set. We haven't even decided who has the authority to run that standard. I mean, what if there's a district that doesn't meet the requirements and can't meet the requirements? Then what?

Huh? Get them help to meet it. But does that make them become a county district at that point?

I've not heard anybody's not meeting it. Is anybody not meeting it?

We have two missions. ISO and fire service response. And I think that those standards are, I mean, it's not something, you're asking us, we don't know. I do now know that there's a different standard in a rural area versus what's in an urban area. There's a different standard when you have businesses that you have to respond to than individuals who live out there. I think these folks know. Has that question ever been posed to the group of the fire service group? Because I think the Rural Fire Board would be a good place to talk about saying, hey, I don't know that using NFPA is realistic becau

Can I ask a question? Yes, ma'am. What is your goal?

Have you met with the individual? Haven't you met with them already? I mean, a long time ago, right? Not just recently.

Well, so I'm still confused as to what we're doing here. That's an exercise that we'll do again. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I don't mean to be hard-nosed. But these guys, I know a lot more than I did when I started fire service and what their – what they need and some folks are a little more desperate than other folks. And I think for us to sit up here and go round and round and round on all these different roles and things, I don't think it accomplishes anything. We need to accomplish something for our fire service because they're the ones out there that maybe in one hour are going to respond to a

such diverse areas of the county and we all have different needs and and we can't be the same we can't i can't be the same yeah and we're not asking you to be the same we're just asking to for us to talk but you know that i mean you know what's needed if you let us keep going

I mean, practically, aren't we already through coordinate? I mean, we already do through coordinate. The question is, where are we with set expectations? Isn't that the line where we seem to have frustration, but I'm not really sure.

I don't mean to be combative, but I still feel like level of service is something that really isn't just, hey, what do I think? It's from the experts. It's from the folks that do this. That's a standard that... until we understand what do you think the level of service is or should be for each station? Do y'all have that? Do y'all have an idea of what that should be? Already? Now? Do our departments already know that?

See, I think that's why we have to start right there because I think we've got to figure out what is that level of service because how do you know how much equipment and personnel is needed to meet that level of service if we don't have that?

But, David, once again, getting back to level of service, once we know an established level of service for every department, then figuring out that is gonna tell us what equipment is necessary to meet that level of service. And until you know that, and until there's an acknowledgement and agreement on that, And I think part of the level of service is going to have to be for the areas that do not have a special tax district. That level of service is driven by the funding that only comes from the rural fire board. And so in order to make it fair, maybe there needs to be a western special tax dis

I think you've got to start there, though.

We have to start with the level of service. What about the state? I mean, there are lots of standards. The NFPA, I think, is the highest. I'm learning as I've gone. NFPA is like the highest unattainable almost, if not truly. And then there are other standards. There's your ISO standard, which is different. That's a different goal. But there's the fire service calls, truly fire service calls. What is the standard for an area in a rural? And my understanding is that could change. If the county jumps in too quick, that can drive up that and drive up the cost and drive up. I mean, I think that's w

agree that we need standards we need to know what's what's meeting and what's not and then we can make a decision on how deep into it we need to go and and as far as the equipment I mean we set a baseline of what the county helps them provide like what we do now and

I'd be more willing to take some folks around, which I ain't got to tell none of these fellas nothing. Cherokee County Union, a lot of them in the room here themselves have had fundraisers and everything and established. And that's why their departments are so personal to them. They put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into. And they own it. They bought it with the community's help. That's what kept them close-knit together.

Well, I also think doing the level of service like you're saying with equipment, there are some areas that don't need, I think my understanding is our equipment policy is just who's next on the list to get the next thing instead of what does this department need to meet their level of service is different than what this department needs. That's why the equipment policy can't even be updated until we know what's needed at each department to deliver the level of service.

I know this, and I don't mean it to be a dadgum joke, but if I went by just saying because something's got some age on it that it ain't worth a hoot, you can ask several in this room here. I wouldn't have attracted one running.

So you're going to meet with each department?

The only thing I'll add in terms of our process going forward, Ms. Conninger just asked, should we hear from folks? And I think having the proper format, I think the way that we would structure this is having this item as a standard item on the monthly JPS meetings that we'll have going forward. Allow folks who are hearing this who are biting at the chumps to say they think they know what the standard is or who want to share something with council. At least maybe that is a way to also hear folks without taking over the workshop today. I think that would be another.

Thank you, David. So I have some just general fire service concerns that have come up. At what point would agreements be made between the county and all the fire districts for like the trucks and the equipment and how much training and who does the training and what the training is? Is the training standardized across all the districts? Or does each department make up their own thing? It's kind of an odd thing, but how do we have non-employees driving county-owned vehicles? How does workers' comp or volunteers' work when they don't work for us? there's all these different agreements are there

And I think a lot of those questions have been brought up piecemeal through legal, which two and a half years ago, I mean, a lot of those questions will require legal input. I think there are considerations that should be listed and should be shared with management, but I think we've got to kind of put some, we've got to, put the rubber to the road in terms of gathering the initial data before we can either, I mean, I think one of those questions needs to be, what are the current agreements that you have with the county? What do you have? Each district may have something different. I mean, we'

I think all of this has to be addressed. I mean, if we don't even have any agreements with anybody, who is responsible? Well, it all has to be.

Can we have those? We have one more. So, I mean, there is a whole lot of liability sitting out there that I feel like that is more or just as important to set an expectation for the response times.

Well, I think it's also about supporting our fire service and giving the support that's needed in them. It's not just, hey, how do we, you know.

And you also are covering the grounds that a lot of, well, the majority of these stations were built on donated land and whatnot and and these communities own these stations and all and i mean there's a lot a lot to that but like i said that i didn't know we had a problem and but i would i would like to ask y'all one thing though When I got on council, it wasn't shortly that this topic come up. But something was said a little bit ago. Council never initiated. It's first brought in and initiated by management. Why did they, even getting on the bandwagon of all this, why do you know why they eve

We may have had that audit, but we also had this thing at a level place and settled that.

I think, David, what else do we need to do to help take the next step in terms of how are we going to get to a

All right. Well, we appreciate all you folks that came out to listen to this dialogue. And at this time, do we have a motion?

Motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, we'll go into executive session. We are out of executive session. Council took no action while in executive session. Are there any motions?

Motion to second. All in favor say aye. Aye. We are adjourned.