Morgan Hill residents aren’t likely to notice any immediate difference in their fire and emergency medical services when CalFire moves in as the new provider next month, but that’s the point, according to city officials and firefighters.
“The (current) service levels are going to be maintained and, frankly, I hope to improve it,” said Steve Woodill, CalFire and South County Fire District Battalion Chief.
Woodill will be the chief of the Morgan Hill Fire Department when CalFire begins its service within the city limits Jan. 3.
It will be the first time that Morgan Hill has its own fire department since 1995, when the city started contracting with the Santa Clara County Central Fire District. Councilmembers continue to laud Central Fire and the County for their favorable fire and Emergency Medical Services.
The City signed a five-year contract with CalFire to staff Morgan Hill stations and equipment in August, in an effort that started more than two years ago to save money.
Since then, City and CalFire staff have been working on the transition to the new provider, and it has been “seamless,” Woodill added.
The primary goal of seeking a new contractor was to achieve financial savings without sacrificing service.
The $19 million, five-year contract with CalFire will save the city about $800,000 per year, even with additional costs of purchasing fire stations, apparatus and other equipment. Last year, the City paid Central Fire about $5.6 million.
CalFire was able to save the City money on personnel costs, staff have said. Other savings come from the City and the South County Fire District sharing resources such as a fire marshal and an EMS consultant. The South County Fire District also contracts with CalFire.
The change in providers required the City to buy back the two fire stations within the city limits – one on Old Monterey Road and one near the intersection of Dunne Avenue and Hill Road. The Council approved the purchase of those stations at last Wednesday’s council meeting for about $2.9 million. The City will pay that cost with a 22-year lease-purchase agreement, at about $294,000 per year, according to City staff.
The City has also purchased new equipment for CalFire staff and these stations. That includes a $2.5 million purchase in August of firefighting apparatuses such as fire engines, a pumper truck and a 105-foot ladder truck.
The equipment is currently being constructed in Wisconsin and will arrive in June 2013, Woodill said. That will likely be the most obvious change that residents might notice, as the trucks will display the new MHFD logo. Until then, the City and CalFire will lease engines from other agencies.
City staff will also directly manage the annual fire and EMS budget for all costs except personnel, which are covered in the CalFire contract. That’s a change from the contract with Central Fire, in which the City has been paying an annual lump sum to the County to cover all of the costs.
“It really will be a city fire department, but all the staffing will be contracted out,” Councilman Gordon Siebert explained.
Most of the existing fees and costs to consumers, such as business inspections and EMS response costs for patients, will stay the same, staff said.
The only exception will be the costs to inspect scores of properties in Morgan Hill that house hazardous materials. Those inspections will be handled by the County Department of Environmental Health, whereas Central Fire has performed the services as long as it has been contracted by the City.
Subject to those inspections are businesses such as gas stations, auto repair shops and dry cleaners. Gas stations will see the biggest hike in inspection fees, which will go up from $633 to $2,513 starting next year, according to city staff.
Fees for auto repair shops and dry cleaners will go up from $341 to $438.
Morgan Hill Community Services Director Steve Rymer added the County Department of Environmental Health next year will begin an outreach and education effort to notify businesses of the changes.
Since September, CalFire has been in the process of hiring new staff for Morgan Hill. That includes three battalion chiefs, a training captain, a fire marshal, a clerical employee and two dispatchers who will be based out of the CalFire station on Monterey Road in south Morgan Hill, Woodill said.
None of the new employees crossed over from Central Fire District, but that district did not suffer any layoffs or significant cuts as a result of the change in providers, Woodill said.
“Any given day, we’ll have three people per engine” on duty, Woodill said.
Councilman Larry Carr said it is “very significant” that the City now owns its fire stations and equipment.
“Purchasing it all back (from the county), in the long run, is better for Morgan Hill. We have ultimate control over those things,” Carr said.
Councilman Rich Constantine said residents might not get an immediate sense of ownership of the fire department because the new staff will need some time to gain “institutional knowledge” of Morgan Hill and interact with the community. But eventually that interaction will be noticed.
“Whenever a city has the ability to have its own services, it provides an enhancement to the service because you get somebody that knows the system intimately,” Constantine said.
With CalFire providing fire and EMS, city residents will benefit from a full “boundary drop” scenario, in which the closest available resources will be deployed to any emergency call, according to Rymer.
The City will also see a greater benefit from having CalFire’s station in the city limits.
“We are now officially being served by three stations,” Rymer said.
Plus, CalFire, Central Fire, the South County Fire District (which serves the unincorporated areas in South County) and even the Gilroy Fire Department will maintain existing “mutual aid” agreements.
“Boundaries do not exist anymore,” Woodill said.
The contract with CalFire also takes the area surrounding the south Morgan Hill station out of the South County Fire District, cutting costs and helping to maintain service in that district as well, Rymer explained.
The south Morgan Hill CalFire station, additionally, will provide dispatch services for the Morgan Hill Fire Department, thus limiting the need to transfer emergency calls multiple times among different agencies in order to respond to incidents, Rymer said. This will cut costs and could result in faster response times.
Siebert added that the more regional approach to fire services that is facilitated by the City’s contract with CalFire will be “in line with the kinds of services and methodologies that cities have to explore, which is a better way to do business.”
In fact, a regionalized approach to provide fire and EMS in South County was a secondary goal of the City’s effort to cut costs that started two years ago. Contracting with CalFire moves the area closer to that goal, but not all the way.
The City would like to see that effort continue in the long run.
“We’re not quite done with that discussion. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to have so many different agencies covering South County,” Councilman Carr said.
