Support for fire district to be sought

Fire officials are proceeding with the steps that must be taken in order to establish a fire district in Freehold Borough.

The men behind the effort to establish a fire district, which would entail a new tax, met with municipal officials in closed session during the Borough Council’s July 19 meeting, according to Freehold Borough Mayor Michael Wilson.

Wilson said the discussion had to take place behind closed doors because it involved contract negotiations. He was not more specific.

Contract negotiations is one item that officials are permitted to discuss outside the presence of the public. Other exceptions to the open meetings law are discussions involving personnel, litigation and the acquisition of property.

Wilson said the fire officials came to the meeting with a proposal for a fire district and told the governing body how the procedure would work.

He said the next step, according to the fire officials, would be for the organizers of the effort to collect between 300 and 500 signatures of registered Freehold Borough voters who would state that they would be in favor of the establishment of a fire district. The petition would then be brought to the council.

If the process reaches that stage, the mayor said he will schedule time at a public meeting for the matter to be discussed.

Wilson said establishing a fire district is not a safety issue.

“In my opinion this is strictly a dollars and sense issue and the governing body at some point will have to make an objective decision on which way to proceed with this with our taxpayers in mind,” the mayor said.

“Does it make more sense to stay as we are or does it make more sense to go with a fire district?” he asked. “Is it dollar wise for the taxpayers? This is the question the governing body must answer objectively. Whatever is right for the taxpayer is what our decision will be based on.”

At the present time the Freehold Fire Department is funded in the municipal budget that is approved every year by the Borough Council. All of the firefighters are volunteers.

If a fire district were to be created, the fire department would no longer be funded in the municipal budget.

Instead, every property owner in Freehold Borough would pay a fire district tax and the total amount of fire district taxes would support the operation of the fire district.

T

he fire district would include the fire

companies that currently make up the Freehold Fire Department. The fire district would be directed by five commissioners elected by voters.

According to Councilwoman Sharon Shutzer, who serves the council as fire commissioner, “The entire issue of establishing a fire district has to be fully researched and understood by all who are affected by it, including the firefighters, the governing body and the residents of Freehold Borough. And at this point in time, I don’t think we are there yet.”

Former Freehold Fire Chief Michael Burtt told council members in June that the fire department needs a new way of running things “because the old way simply is no longer working.”

He said another way must be put in place to fund the operation of a fire department that currently has 105 volunteer members.

Burtt said a committee was formed to explore different ways of operating the fire department that might make things work better. A fire district was the most viable possibility, according to Burtt.

Lisa Ryan, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Community Affairs, (DCA), explained that in order to create a fire district at least 5 percent of the registered voters in the municipality must notify their local government that they would like to see a fire district in the town.

“Once the petition is certified, meaning that all of the signatures are verified registered voters, the local governing body must submit the proposal for a fire district to the Local Finance Board of the DCA,” Ryan said. “They must appear before the board.

“If the Local Finance Board approves the proposal, the local governing body must introduce and adopt an ordinance to create the fire district. Once the ordinance is adopted, the fire district is created and then the (voters of the) district will elect a board of commissioners which will be the governing body of the fire department,” Ryan said.

Burtt said the process of gathering signatures from registered voters will begin now.