Emotions ran raw again Thursday night as Fruitland Park commissioners unanimously instructed City Manager Gary La Venia to explore contracting with Lake County for fire services for the older part of the city.
The decision came after La Venia presented commissioners with an email he received last month from Lake County Deputy Manager John Molenda. In the email, Molenda said Lake County Fire Rescue often is called upon to cover the original portion of the city when it’s fire department goes “out of service.” Molenda’s email didn’t concern The Villages portion of Fruitland Park, as that fire service is provided by The Villages Public Safety Department.
Molenda said Fruitland Park’s Station 56 was out of service 61 times in the first seven months of this year. He said there were more out of service days in the first five months of this year than in all of 2019, when there was an average of 3.7 times per month as opposed to the current eight times per month.
Molenda said “it is imperative” that the Fruitland Park station stay available to respond to calls as the closet unit in the older part of the city and as a backup or secondary unit on specific incidents assigned by the countywide dispatch system or the Lake County medical director. He added that there’s already a “demand” placed on surrounding fire units because the Fruitland Park department provides basic life support versus advanced life support like most other fire departments throughout the state.
“The absence is becoming more frequent, jeopardizing the safety of not only the public but also other emergency responders in need of backup and assistance,” Molenda wrote.
Molenda said another issue is that response times of surrounding units increase when the Fruitland Park department goes out of service.
“Further, patient care and protection of life and property are hindered as a result of the disruption,” he said, adding that roughly one in five Lake County Fire Rescue responses to Fruitland Park comes because Station 56 is out of service. “The lack of consistent staffing has a domino effect on the entire system.”
Fruitland Park Fire Chief Donald Gilpin said many of the out-of-service calls involve mandatory training days, which takes the city’s only staffed engine out of service, as well as some instances for equipment maintenance. But he said he wasn’t sure how many of the 61 out of service instances were because of training versus a lack of training – a response that angered Mayor Chris Cheshire, who chastised Gilpin and said he wished he were more prepared to answer pertinent questions about his department.
Gilpin and Commissioner Patrick DeGrave, who spent 39 years in local government in Wisconsin and Illinois, tangled over various questions about the fire department. DeGrave said it always seems to become an emotional issue when the department is discussed – a similar discussion erupted during a meeting in January and in October 2019 – and pointed out that the issue has been on the table for the two years he’s been in office.
“As the city expands, of course, the fire department will have to expand along with it, so costs will simply continue to grow,” DeGrave said.
Bell referred back to an emotional past meeting when residents came to defend their local volunteer fire department, which is now a thing of the past.
“At that point it was about tied as far as going to the county,” he said. “Now, it’s cheaper to go to the county, cheaper for the residents. That’s what we’re here doing, is representing our residents. We need to keep the costs down for them.”
DeGrave said the issue had been discussed enough and contracting with Lake County to provide services would be a much better deal, both financially and in the coverage provided. Commissioner John Mobilian agreed, adding that it simply comes down to finances for him and the fact that the city can’t afford to fund its own fire department as it continues to grow.
Gilpin argued that it would be possible to have such a department and suggested that he’d seek a variety of grants to help pay for it. He said the department could operate full-time with six firefighters and part-timers to fill in on shifts when needed.
After the discussion went back and forth between the commission for several minutes, Cheshire had had enough. He scolded Gilpin, who earlier had said he had been seeking a workshop with commissioners to discuss the fire department. He said Thursday night would have been the perfect time to have that discussion if he had been prepared.
With that, the commission agreed to have La Venia contact Lake County to see what kind of contract would be available to provide fire services to the city. Cheshire said he was “done” with the issue and an obviously upset Gilpin quickly left the meeting.
